Management’s highest priority is employee productivity. Inevitably this means that the relatively small number of managers in every organization is faced with the challenge of monitoring a large number of employees. In response to this challenge, designers of today’s organizational structures turned to the Panopticon. The design of this building invented by the English philosopher Jeremy…
Micro-Managing In a recent blog post describing how feedback control works and its importance to the effective functioning of any organization, I mentioned that organizations that are micro-managed are much less well able to respond rapidly to problems discovered lower down in the organization. Through the deployment of Talent Chaser, we have discovered that this…
Frequent Appraisals Through the deployment of Talent Chaser, we have found that the very best way to get managers to face up to performance problems is to require them to undertake performance appraisals frequently. Currently, while many organizations measure the performance of their employees annually, less than 15% do this on a frequent basis. When…
The Need for Rapid Response As the world has become more fast-changing and complex, planning has become much more difficult. Take, for example, the challenges associated with launching a new product. Not that many years ago, the market reacted in a more leisurely manner. Immediately after launch, initial sales would be to early responders. Only…
The hysteresis effect describes how managers typically cling to outmoded stereotypes. Because of this, as the performance of individuals reporting to them changes, they often remain unaware of this until these changes become extreme. One effect of this is that managers often fall prone to the ‘last-minute’ syndrome in which they suddenly become completely dissatisfied…
What is Feedback Control? Feedback control was first developed by engineers as a technique to control complex systems functioning within dynamic environments. It turns out that this technique has relevance to the work environment and can help make managers aware of the difference between what the employee is actually doing compared to that…
Management Inconsistency Can Lead to Employee Turnover Through the deployment of an evidence-based approach to both recruitment and management development, it has become clear that inconsistency in the way in which employees are managed can lead to increased employee turnover rates. The consent is that: Employees need to know that they are being treated consistently…
Are Performance Appraisals a Waste of Time? Many managers, when asked their opinion about performance appraisals, report that they believe it to be an unwelcome distraction that serves little or no useful purpose. Many management gurus advise organizations against appraising their employees. Additionally, when organizations employ some form of appraisal, they often do this only…
Managers often wonder: Is there a way to hold staff fully accountable for poor performance without adversely impacting employee turnover figures?When it comes to holding an employee accountable, several factors need to be taken into account.Before an employee can be held fully accountable, these matters need to be addressed: The employee’s targets must be clearly…
Not Everyone Has the Same Motivations Through the deployment of the Talent Chaser Performance Appraisal and Task Action Planning Module, we generated loads of interesting and insightful data. In my blog post Should Pay be linked to Performance?,I mentioned that each employee will be either intrinsically or extrinsically motivated. When it comes to whether or…
