Take hiring seriously

Make sure that you are hiring the right people, both for the role and for your business. Never let yourself be rushed into making hasty recruitment decisions. If you really can’t wait to get more hands on deck, bring in agency workers.

Set up your employees for success

One of the golden rules of effective employee management is to make it easy for your employees to do what you want them to do. Here are the basic points to cover.

What is their workplace location?

If the role is hybrid, how often does the employee need to be on-site? What implications does that have for their work? For example, if an employee is hybrid, do they need equipment at home and at work? Alternatively, are they expected to carry their equipment between home and work?

It’s important to be clear about this before you onboard someone. For many people having an agreeable workplace is key to them enjoying their job. An employee enjoying their job is often key to employee engagement and hence employee performance.

What are their working hours?

In some roles, employees simply need to put in a certain number of hours within certain times. In others, they may need to have their time scheduled. If they do need to be scheduled, then using proper employee scheduling software can make this much easier.

In fact, employee scheduling software often comes in useful even when people work fixed hours. It lets everyone see who is assigned to what task at any given time. Possibly more importantly, using employee scheduling software makes it quick and easy to update schedules.

What do they need to work effectively?

There are usually three areas you need to look at here. These are information, equipment and training.

Information

New hires are almost invariably going to need some level of guidance to adapt to their new employer. If you have an in-house HR team, they handle this as part of the onboarding process. If you don’t, use a third-party HR service to guide you through developing an effective onboarding process.

Remember to think about what is important to your new employee as well as to you. For example, in the real world, most people want to be officially put on payroll as quickly as possible. From an employer’s perspective, it also makes sense to deal with payroll quickly.

Equipment

Equipment can be physical or digital. For example, if an employee needs a licence for software, this is also classed as equipment. With employment, the employer is responsible for providing the employee with everything they need to do their job. This is one of the major differences between taking on employees and working with freelancers.

Providing employees with the right equipment is often one of the most important parts of employee management. Anything that makes an employee’s job easier almost certainly improves their productivity. This delivers the best value for your labour costs. It is also very likely to increase their enjoyment of the job. Again, this generally increases employee engagement and hence employee performance.

Training

Very similar comments apply to providing employees with the right training. It’s particularly important when they are new to the business. In general, most people need, or at least benefit from, ongoing training throughout their employment.

There are two keys to delivering effective training, and hence high-quality employee management. The first is to identify what an employee needs to know at their stage of development. The second is to make sure that you are delivering the training in the right way.

For example, with new employees, start by guiding them through the basic workflow of their role. Hopefully, you have already worked to streamline this as much as possible. If not, address this quickly.

As the employee develops, increase their level of responsibility. This may well include further training. Just remember to keep the pace at which you challenge them in line with the pace of their development. This is one of the most important fundamentals of employee management.

Managing performance and development

Employee management can often be split into two main phases. The first is the phase of getting the employee up to speed in their role. The second is the phase of ongoing performance management.

It’s absolutely vital that performance management is undertaken as objectively as possible. Ideally, develop a system for managing performance in collaboration with your HR team or HR service.

Here is a quick overview of generally how to approach this area of employee management.

Define key performance indicators

Key performance indicators (KPIs) are objective ways to measure an employee’s performance in their role. For example, in most roles, productivity is considered a KPI.

For measuring purposes, set out what productivity means for that particular role. For example, in some environments productivity could mean tasks completed. In others, by contrast, it could mean progress made towards higher-level goals.

Set out ways these KPIs can be measured

More specifically, KPIs need to be fairly measured. In practical terms, this means accurately and consistently measured. Creating a system for measuring KPIs can be one of the most challenging aspects of employee management. It is vital to get it right for both ethical and legal reasons. Again, this is an area where HR may be able to help considerably.

Implement your system

Consider your initial implementation a test. Be prepared to update it in light of the results you see. Remember that employee management is not about getting everything perfect the first time. It’s about doing your best to get the best from your employees.

Communicate your findings to your employees

Even in this age of technology, one of the most effective tools in employee management is the old-school one-to-one. Make time to feedback to your employees as individuals. Also, make time to listen to feedback from them. Take this seriously and act on it when you can. When you can’t, explain why you can’t. If possible, offer an alternative solution or at least a workaround.

Offer performance-based rewards

In some business areas (especially sales), it’s standard to offer monetary rewards for meeting or exceeding targets. Most payroll systems can cope with this. With that said, rewards don’t have to be monetary to be effective. Simple praise can do, as can treats, like a team night out.

Be prepared to tackle underperformance

Dealing with underperformance is unlikely ever to be considered one of the most enjoyable parts of employee management. Sadly, it can be a necessary one. On the plus side, addressing performance issues does genuinely benefit the employee as well as the employer.

If the performance issue is resolved, the employee gets better value from the role. They also deliver better value to their team and employer. If it’s not, it’s in everyone’s best interest that the employee moves on.