In my last blog, I talked about how important true leader support is for the success of any business improvement endeavor. Business leaders, like any of us, respond well if they can clearly see ways to achieve their objectives better, easier, and faster.
Thousands of books, articles and online resources constantly tell us the “best” way to do all that. The simple truth is that they all kind of say the same thing:
You have to address all the issues to get the performance and the results you want.
In our performance consultancy at Media 1, we have been working on ways to fully, integrate learning and performance improvement into the entire talent management ecosystem. We believe that effective change management needs to happen as a continuous process, not as a series of disconnected events strung together out of context.
Basically, you need ongoing learning and performance initiatives that are supported in a variety of ways in the workplace to allow engaged and committed employees to get the results needed for business success. Leaders tend to support things like that because they see the value.
What does this mean for you? It means that if you want to transform yourself into a true performance artist, you have to decide to get beyond the latest business improvement fads and go back to a simple construct that’s been around for decades. Getting better business results—whether for our clients, for our employees, or for ourselves as individuals—means tapping into the well-researched and well-established performance factors of the Performance Improvement Factors Grid. (T. Gilbert).
The Performance Improvement Factors Grid (or just Performance Grid) highlights a systemic view of performance improvement and has long been a cornerstone of the performance consultant’s knowledge base and methodology. It is a proven model that can be applied to a whole organization, to an organizational process, or at an individual job performer level.
And yet, it’s pretty simple. In fact, it could even be drawn on a napkin. (Just make sure it’s not a linen napkin—restaurants don’t like that.)
For the best performance improvement results, try using this:
The Performance Grid shows the factors affecting performance improvement and how they're connected.
At first glance, it may be hard to parse out what this chart is trying to show you. Take a closer look, and you’ll see that the Performance Grid demonstrates what common sense tells us. Optimal performance and employee engagement happens when organizations have all the right supporting pieces in the right places. There are many factors to consider, but this model simply segments them into six major categories. Each of them is connected in some way to either encourage or inhibit positive change.
The work environment (i.e. the organization) needs to provide clear expectations and timely feedback as well as the right tools, systems, processes, and resources. And the organization has to assure that the right mix of incentives and consequences exists to encourage employees to take the right actions that get the right results…at the right times.
But successful performance improvement does not lie solely with the workplace or rest exclusively on the shoulders of leadership to provide the information, expectations, systems, and incentives. Employees need to bring certain necessary skills, capabilities, and motives to the table as well.
Arguably, most concepts of human performance can be wrapped up in this model. In fact, many professionals have made entire careers out of each of these individual performance factor areas. Clearly the major component areas of traditional HR and talent management have great interplay here—everything from Selection and Recruitment to Career Management and Performance Appraisal to Organizational Development.
The most obvious of these areas can be Learning and Development, but sometimes it’s overemphasized. Traditional training focuses almost exclusively on knowledge and skill acquisition. Training is fine—and is often part of a successful performance solution when it’s done well—but performance improvement comes from the right balance of solutions that address all of the performance factors. Training alone isn’t usually enough.
So what does that “right” balance for a performance improvement solution look like?
We’ve already established that the six performance improvement factors outlined in the Performance Grid tell us the employee bears some of the responsibility for performance and the organization bears the rest. But surprisingly, it’s not always a 50-50 split between the organizational side and the employee side. On average about 70-80% of typical performance-related issues relate to the organizational side of things. And 20-30% is usually in the realm of an employee to control.
This means that, as an employee, you not only need to have the right skills and attitudes to do the job, but you also need to be supported by a good workplace atmosphere—one that provides the right environment, tools, and incentives for you to do your job well. As discussed in my last article, that’s where the role of great leader buy-in starts to have a real impact.
For employers and talent managers who want stellar results, this means finding the right people first and then supporting them with the best tools and support mechanisms second. The Performance Grid reminds us that this is more than just a good idea; it’s crucial.
It means designing multi-part strategies that address all six areas influencing performance in the real world—and especially those at the organizational level—that may be holding back desired outcomes.
With new technologies, we have the ability to figure out what really drives performance and design and implement larger, over-arching and ever-more effective organizational solutions that help improve performance and increase business results. A new set of skills and tools (such as social media and SharePoint™) are emerging that add necessary functionality and workflow to learning opportunities both in the traditional sense of corporate learning and in the more integrated day-to-day activities of employees.
We have to adapt to the changing needs of today’s corporate learners. As organizations, we need to provide the performance support they need to create the positive results that business leaders need.
Most training and development professionals are at least generally aware of this by now, but it’s time to broaden our thinking and find creative ways to address performance factors more effectively in the corporate environment. One idea is to take a closer look at collaborative and integrated learning models that scaffold onto existing learning systems, portals, or document repositories while enhancing them with a layer of technology—such as SharePoint™.
The time to find new performance support solutions is now because we don’t have time or money to waste.
Certainly business leaders know that.
Think about it. What have you done to push the boundaries of performance lately?
Next time I write, I’ll talk a bit more about those boundaries in more detail—what effects performance improvement, why it matters and what you can do about it. In the meantime, though, consider taking a look at the first draft of The Integrated Learning Manifesto that we recently developed here at Media 1. It is the culmination of two years of intensive work in designing and piloting a new direction for corporate learning and performance improvement.
Chris Willis
Harrison Withers
atroccko
John Chapin
AliciaMarie Belchak
media1bill
MWykes
October 17th, 2011 → 2:24 pm
[...] Solutions generally come in sets to address people, process, and technology issues. Keep in mind, it’s all based on a “performance viewpoint”—something we’ll discuss in my next blog entry. [...]