Target set but are your employees completing the actions agreed in their professional development plans and really benefiting from doing so…..or has the process become a tedious paperwork exercise that you wish you’d never started?!
Are review meetings filled with the buzz of excitement and reporting on great progress, with a keen drive for new challenges and further progression…..or are they filled with a sorry list of excuses about why targets haven’t been met?!
Call them what you like – professional development plans, appraisals, targets, reviews, objectives, career planning – if you aren’t getting the commitment or results you intended then it’s time to take a long hard look at what might be going wrong…
This article featured in training zone makes some interesting observations and asks some interesting questions:
1. Are the targets relevant enough to the work?
2. Are the target periods short enough to ensure the targets stay relevant in a rapidly changing work environment?
3. Are the targets flexible enough to adapt if things change?
4. Are you as a the manager hindering progress towards the targets at all?
5. What incentive is there to achieve the targets?
6. Are the targets important for the employee’s career aspirations?
7. Are there practical blocks to achieving the targets – time / resources / people / training etc?
And having asked those questions the key next step is of course to decide what you and your employees are going to do to change anything that needs changing?