Management Training – Page 53 – STL

Are performance appraisals good or bad?

There are staggering repercussions to conducting performance appraisals, especially in context to overall team performance, productivity and efficiency. Some may consider the appraisal to be a time-consuming event best suited to the ‘quiet’ times in the business. Others argue that they neither effect performance nor offer any real financial remunerations. Are they a waste of time?

Consider – are the dynamics of these infrequent appraisals inferior to the daily task of hands-on management, which is far more instantaneous? Rarely are they an investigation on how you can improve another, instead they are an opportunity to value an individual and I am not talking about ‘praise.’

STL training london performance appraisals — **Winning appraisals**

It’s all about them

How well do you know the ambitions of those who work for you? With the fast pace of life, the in-house dog fights and external commitments, professional ambitions can change. Individual perspectives can alter by internal opportunities, a new sales demographic, or even a personal achievement such as buying a house or the need to support a relative. The most significant attribute of appraisals is the opportunity they present to align business with personal objectives. And in so doing strengthen trust and confidence.

How well do you know your team?

Asking the right questions can support an individual driven to do well and succeed. Most professionals want to enjoy the rewards of success. Yes, there are those who prefer to quietly go about their work methodically and undisturbed. Is it not the individual perspective of success that counts?

Which of these five means success to you?

Money
Recognition & reputation
Promotion
Responsibility
Security

First, we understand what motivates us so we can understand what motivates others. Ask yourself:

What would your best day look like?
If you could re-organise your job role what duties would you take, what would you lose?
In five years’ time, what would you have liked to achieve personally and professionally?
What’s the one strength you would like to use more of?
Name one area you would love to improve.

Questions like these can lead to rewarding conversations in appraisals. Reflecting on your personal objectives to team mates is incredibly influential in helping people to ‘snap-out of’ the limbo-land we often find ourselves in.

By challenging others with the opportunity to assess themselves we effectively shake-the-tree. Remember, the response when you confront others with these questions will be to confound and confuse. Your job is to plant seeds and get them thinking.

There are two main keys to giving appraisals that most forget.

Do it regularly

Every three months is without doubt the most potent time frame to conduct appraisals. It keeps the individual thinking:

How to redesign and reaffirm their objectives.
what achievement means to them and
how they can better affect the operation to achieve this.
What better conversations can be built over time to strengthen trust and energise motivation.

It’s all about them

Your goal in management is to inspire and maintain performance. The one thing that won’t fit this neatly is individual perspective. Through appraisals we can align the objectives and pursuits of the business to the ambitions of the employee – whatever those ambitions are.

Being a great team happens through coaching and leadership. Appraisals allow others to set realistic targets and support them to achieve their goals. Maybe we just got the name and focus wrong? Rather than Performance Appraisals maybe we should call it Mentoring & Guidance? It makes quite a difference.

The nature of nerves

Several years ago, a survey was conducted to identify the top 10 public fears. Public speaking came up as number 1! Above spiders and other creepy crawlies, deep water, heights, illness, financial worries, open spaces, flying – death came in about number 9 on the list. The key point here is that apparently the scariest thing we can do in our lives is stand in front of people and speak.

Why the fear factor?

Public speaking is often considered an umbrella fear meaning many different fears bundled together under one heading. We tend to focus on the many things that could go wrong when presenting.

For example my mouth will dry up, my mind will go blank, I’ll fall over, I’ll burst into tears, they’ll laugh at me, I’ll swear and embarrass myself and my boss, who’s in the audience.

Presentation Courses in London for Business

A wise man once said: ‘the human brain is a wonderful thing. It starts working the moment you are born, and doesn’t stop until you stand up to speak in public’.

Basically we imagine the worst case scenario and carry that with us into the presentation.

The physical effects

As soon as you perceive a threat (you have to deliver a presentation to 20 people) and become nervous, your primitive survival instinct, fight or flight, ignites. Your brain releases 2 stimulants into your bloodstream, adrenaline and cortisol, which bring about immediate physical changes.

Our heart rate increases; the heart is now working overtime, pumping blood and oxygen to the parts of us which need it most to keep us alive. Ultimately it just wants us to be physically strong enough to deal with the threat – to either fight back, or to run away (take flight).
Your body temperature rises. Who doesn’t get sweaty when they are nervous?
A rush of blood to the head? This explains why a lot of people’s faces turn red when they’re either angry or embarrassed.
Butterflies in your stomach? The blood normally reserved for this area has been sent to other parts of your body, so you feel nauseous.

The main message here is that the fight or flight instinct gives us a colossal amount of nervous energy. Let’s use it!

With practice, this energy becomes your ally when presenting, and can have a significant impact on performance. If you turn it in on yourself, it becomes anxiety which eats away at you. However, if you send it outwards towards the audience, it manifests itself as energy, enthusiasm and vitality. This works incredibly well.

So what’s the big secret?

How do we become more confident presenters? Is it acupuncture, aromatherapy, breathing exercises, hypnotherapy? Perhaps, but for me, the answer is much simpler: practice. Practice, practice, practice and then practice some more. The more you repeat any skill or behaviour, the more it becomes embedded. Whenever opportunities to present arise, grab them with both hands. Not an easy answer but the most effective one!

Conclusion

What have we learnt? If we get nervous before a presentation, that’s good! It means we’re human and not perfect presenting robots. With practice, we can harness the nervous energy and use it to be an enthusiastic and engaging presenter.

Mark Twain once said this: “There are 2 kinds of public speaker. Those that are nervous, and those that are liars.”

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