Improve the performance management cycle? Piece of cake anyway

You have come up with a great plan to make the world a little better, the start-up rolls off the production line, enthusiastic people join, and then HR suddenly pops up around the corner. All these enthusiastic people want to be able to develop themselves and that doesn't happen by itself, and you as managers have an important role to play in this. How do you give shape to that role, how do you organize the performance management cycle and what decisions do you make regarding salary? In short; how do you deal with your people? 

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Redesigning the performance management cycle

This is the issue with which In Ovo knocked on our door, a scale-up that focuses on chick welfare. In addition to the welfare of the chicks, they also care a great deal about their people; they are the determining factor in achieving goals and increasing impact. Therefore, they want to get their performance management cycle right. The goal of this cycle should be to create a team in which everyone is clear about what their role is and how they contribute to the goals. This creates an effective team in which everyone can work and develop with energy. 

We started our HR kickoff in which we took a broad look at the organization. This revealed that there were actually no regular discussions between employees and managers, even though there was a need for this from both sides. Employees wanted to receive more feedback and guidance in order to work more specifically on their development, but managers lacked the tools to do so. In addition, there was an old-fashioned view of the performance management cycle. That it is a top-down and judgmental process that is mainly a 'must do'. The expectations therefore did not match how they would like it.  

From the HR kick-off, we highlighted three aspects to work on:

1. Set goals at the individual level and high-over to make development concrete. 
2. Improve and streamline Feedback & Coaching
3. Making assessment more insightful

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Incubating together for an appropriate course of action

Together with In Ovo, we developed a roadmap appropriate to the growth phase of their company and the needs of both the leadership team and the employees. From there, we rolled out a framework with guidelines within which In Ovo has a lot of freedom to fill in frequency and topics themselves. By giving them this basic framework including tools to expand where necessary and possible, they can make their performance management cycle appropriate for each individual. On this basis, we have brought about beautiful changes that bring managers and employees closer together and make the opportunity for development more concrete. 

Thus there is now clarity for each employee about their role, what their added value is in the bigger picture and in which role they can make the most impact. The feedback & coaching has been taken in hand in such a way that there is a fixed rhythm for 1-on-1 conversations between manager and employee. Not only when something is wrong, but also when everything is going well in order to stay in touch with each other. In order to support In Ovo in this, we have drawn up templates for employee and manager for holding such conversations. To then get a better grip on the assessment, we found a way to give the managers tools with which they can keep track of the team, the needs and the necessary action points. 

Of course this also included some practical matters such as a digital employee handbook, a clear and easy contract, the concretization of the salary and job structure and the fine-tuning of the onboarding process for new employees. Now the first three months at In Ovo have been arranged in such a way that it can only go smoothly and be a very pleasant experience.

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Where are we now

In Ovo now has a scalable model that is tailored to the individual. Because it stems from the value In Ovo gives to the development of their employees, it truly fits the company. It is not just a one-size-fits-all approach, but can be flexibly applied to the needs of the employees. As a result, the manager-employee dynamic has changed. Everyone is much more aware of the roles, what the responsibilities are and how important it is that everyone gets attention, no matter what stage of growth and development they are in. 

HR choices are often still overlooked, especially in a hectic scale-up. An important part of this program was therefore to make everyone aware of the choices you have to make and what impact they have on the company culture. The entire organization now works together in a different way, with room for development of both the individual and the company. Within a year we have improved the processes and made them scalable. So that also after our cooperation the performance management cycle continues to run smoothly. 

Okay, so getting back to the title, it's not exactly a piece of cake, but it is incredibly valuable. Want to improve your performance management cycle, too? Engage our people partners!