MAXIMISING THE RESULTS OF A STAFF REVIEW MEETING

In the last issue we looked at the running order of a review meeting and how to ensure that it runs for an hour rather than drifting on inconclusively for a much longer period of time.

Over the next couple of issues we will look at some of the crucial aspects of the meeting and how to ensure they run smoothly, so that reviews result in you and your employees feeling motivated and ready to meet the challenges of the next period.

(It might be useful to refer back to the previous issue to re-familiarise yourself with the running order as we run through this.)

Maximising the results: the introduction.

In the last issue we emphasised the importance of putting yourself and the employee at ease and building rapport. This is vital for the success of the whole meeting.

Once you are both comfortable then you can take control and explain the purpose of the meeting. This introduction should set the whole tone of the meeting and the better prepared you are for it the more likely you are to obtain the results you are seeking. The way to achieve this is to ensure that the employee’s mindset is positive in the first place, rather than negative and defensive.

There is a term in NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming) called 'pre-framing'. I have used the technique in my business dealings for some time but until I learned more about NLP I didn’t have a label to attach to it, which made it harder to explain and train others in. Simply put, pre-framing is looking at the likely objections and dealing with them before they arise in a conversation.

So, before the review, think about the likely concerns that your employee might have as they enter the meeting, and remember back to when you had your first review by a manager with whom you had no working history.

As well as you might have felt you had worked, you will have approached the meeting with trepidation and you will have been worried about your boss’s views on you; his or her perception of your performance and the outcomes. You may even have been concerned about keeping your job. List the concerns that you had and think about the concerns that will be going through your employee's mind.

The review meeting would be a lot more positive if your employee came in without those concerns, and the whole experience would then become much more open and constructive. So, the question is, how can we 'pre-frame' these concerns? A statement along the lines of the following would be a major step to achieving this.

“Right, before we start, I just want to run through the reason for the meeting and how I conduct them so that they work really well for you and I. Sometimes at the start people can feel anxious which is fair enough but they quickly realise that reviews with me are friendly, constructive and motivating. And they provide an open platform for us to develop you and your career and meet the business aims too. So, actually we are going to have a really constructive meeting and come out feeling positive and motivated and make a real difference over the next month.”

The statement is non-specific and acknowledges that there may be a little anxiety and re-assures. It sets the tone for the meeting so that, provided you do hold the meeting in the manner you have stated, it will run well.

Over time, once the employee has experienced a few positive, constructive and motivating reviews with you, the pre-framing will not be so relevant. On the basis of their positive experiences, they will approach the review with relish and even when something hasn’t gone as well as it should have, they will be prepared for the constructive conversation and be able to explain what they would do differently next time - so the difficult part of the review passes by without issues and has a very positive result.

In my view, how you set up and introduce the review are the most important aspects of ensuring that the review runs well.

Next Time

Next time we look at hints and techniques to ensure the review meeting itself runs smoothly.