Category: Staff Management (Page 3 of 3)

Training And Development Of Staff

June 6, 2013 / HRwisdom

Training and development of staff – this is one of the key issues addressed in the free HRwisdom Employee Attraction & Retention Guide available for download here now.

In HRwisdom Community Employee Attraction & Retention Guide, sixteen expert employee management practitioners from all areas of the human resources field offer their best employee attraction & retention advice.

Other Resources You Might Like:

Financial Awareness Staff Training Module (Free Use For 1 Week)

Good Advice On Workforce Productivity

Free Workplace Bullying Training

Training and Development of Staff

Much of the information in the comprehensive free guide goes towards answering questions around Training and development of staff.

In the wider context, the free guide has been developed to help business owners and Human Resources professionals who want to fast-track their staff management success.

Expert Advice On Training and Developing Employees

One such expert contributor is Alan Hargreaves.

Alan Hargreaves has spent 35 years in financial services and business consulting.

Alan’s approach to management is highly effective, yet inspiringly simple. It focuses on real issues rather than strategic principles. His innovative mix of personal and collaborative action brings immediate traction. He is author of the management book, Recharge, published by John Wiley and Sons.

Alan is a director and partner of Hargreaves Revis Wills, which provides bespoke mentoring services to senior executives. He is regularly engaged as a speaker, consultant and mentor.

In his article, Alan puts a unique service perspective on the issue of staff development. This perspective provides a powerful way to build trust and loyalty with your staff. By adopting some of Alan’s ideas, you may well be pleasantly surprised by the result.

Download The Free Employee Attraction & Retention Guide

For instant download of the comprehensive free “HRwisdom Community Employee Attraction & Retention Guide,” click on Employee Attraction & Retention Guide now.

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Good Advice On Workforce Productivity

June 5, 2013 / HRwisdom

Major new research and advice on workforce productivity by global consulting firm Ernst & Young has added weight to the seven step high performance process outlined in a recent HRwisdom workforce productivity presentation.

The free presentation (click here to see the: high performance team presentation) was conducted by the lead consultant from an award-winning human resources consulting firm in Brisbane.

The Ernst & Young data was recently published as the ‘Australian Productivity Pulse’ (we’ve put the link to the report in our Free Resources area – just log in now for free using the login form over on the right hand side).

Workforce Productivity Report

The Australian Productivity Pulse suggested that around $109 billion in wages is wasted every year due to poor productivity issues.

The report found that, at an individual employee level, work done that adds ‘real value’ equals 58% of the working day whilst activities such as personal development & networking account for 24%.

Eighteen per cent of the average working day is spent doing work that ‘wastes time and effort’ – an astonishing figure.

Other Resources You Might Like:

Financial Awareness Staff Training Module (Free Use For 1 Week)

How To Manage Redundancies Without Destroying All Employee Goodwill

Areas Of Workplace Productivity To Improve

The Australian Productivity Pulse identifies four main areas to improve:

People management issues: developing and utilising the full talents and capabilities of human capital.
Organisation structure, design and operating model: removing all wasteful, bureaucratic, and non-value work and outputs.
Innovation: being deliberate and audacious with an innovation agenda.
Technology: being more ambitious and effective in process automation and technological change.

Of interest were also the Pulse’s findings that thirty-two percent of employees are planning to leave their organisation in the next 12 months.

A further thirty-five per cent of staff are already pursuing external opportunities.

50% of the employees surveyed felt that a lack of career direction inside their organisation was forcing them to look elsewhere to achieve their career goals.

To read the report, just log in to the free HRwisdom resources area now (use the form over on the right hand side).

Get More Good Advice On Workforce Productivity Here

Don’t forget to watch the excellent free HRwisdom presentation: The 7 Things That Set High Performing Organisations Apart.

The free staff management presentation provides excellent advice on workforce productivity.

During this free on-demand webinar presentation, you’ll get:

Practical insights into the important things that set high performing organisations apart.
The seven things that make them high performers.
Five simple steps to take action on this powerful information.

You can see the presentation here: Good Advice on Workforce Productivity Presentation

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voluntary redundancy vs forced redundancy

Recent Job Losses In Australia [Plus Free Interview On Managing Redundancies]

May 24, 2013 / HRwisdom

It’s been a rough few weeks for redundancies and job losses in the Australian labour market.

Today we’re looking at the recent announcements.

We’re also sharing another helpful free HRwisdom resource on the right way to handle redundancies.

Before we get started, you may also be interested in these other HRwisdom articles (they will open in a new window):

Bizarre – Why Did They Fire This Punctual, Top Performing Employee?

Free Information Sessions On Workplace Law For Employers

How To Really Freak Out Your Workforce

Recent Job Losses

This week, it was announced that the national cleaning company Swan Services was going into administration with the loss of nearly 2500 jobs.

Nine hundred of those job losses were in NSW and 578 were in Victoria.

A further 583 people lost their jobs in Queensland, 184 in Western Australia, 156 in South Australia and 64 in the ACT.

The Sydney Morning Herald reported that the union was now involved:

[quote] The national president of the union United Voice, Michael Crosby, yesterday said Swan had been one of the five biggest cleaning businesses in the country, and its woes followed a string of collapses in the industry. “Swan Services could potentially owe cleaners hundreds of thousands of dollars in entitlements, including annual leave, sick leave, unpaid wages, superannuation and we want to ensure they are protected,” Mr Crosby said.[/quote]

To add to these woes, Ford Australia announced major job losses in its Victorian operations.

The Age summarised the job losses in this media report:

[quote]Ford Australia has announced it will slash jobs — and production — at its Broadmeadows and Geelong plants by almost a third as slow sales of its Falcon large family car bite hard. The company today announced up to 440 workers, mainly from its factories, would be offered voluntary redundancies as part of a massive restructure of its workforce taking place over the next three months.[/quote]

The public sector isn’t safe either, it would seem according to the Federal Opposition Leader Tony Abbott in his recent Budget reply speech (although he says it will happen through natural attrition):

[quote]”We’ve announced that we’ll reduce by at least 12,000, through natural attrition, the size of the Commonwealth public sector that’s now 20,000 bureaucrats bigger than in 2007.” [/quote]

Difficult times indeed.

The Right Way To Handle Redundancies

For any employer seeking advice on how to handle redundancies and job losses, we recommend you listen to our excellent redundancies information interview.

The interview is free and it provides you with thoughtful insights into how to manage redundancies without destroying all employee goodwill.

HRwisdom

Australian Government Gives $20 Million To Combat Workplace Bullying [So Here’s Your Free Workplace Bullying E-Learning Module]

May 16, 2013 / HRwisdom

Workplace Bullying is a major problem in all economies.

The Australian Government estimates that workplace bullying costs the national economy over $36 million dollars per year in lost productivity.

As a result, the recent Federal Budget allocated over $20 million dollars to the Fair Work Commission so that it could do more in this troublesome area.

Free Workplace Bullying E-Learning Module

HRwisdom has a special limited-time bonus: One week of free E-learning for employers.

Please Note: This special bonus is only available within Australia.

HRwisdom has arranged for you to get one free week’s use of one of Savv-e’s popular compliance training modules, including the excellent module on workplace bullying.

Obviously, this bonus will only be available for a very limited time.

We suggest you grab the workplace bullying module right now.

Get Your Free Workplace Bullying E-Learning Now

If you would like one week’s free use of one of the online compliance modules we have chosen for HRwisdom, fill in the form below.

This bonus will only be available for a very limited time so we suggest you grab it now.

Feel free to forward this message on to your friends and colleagues.

To request the free trial, please put your contact details and your preferred training module in the box below.

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How To Manage Redundancies Without Destroying All Staff Goodwill [Audio Interview]

April 26, 2013 / HRwisdom

HRwisdom asked one of its contributors, Jacqui Alder, what was her advice for businesses on how to manage redundancies without destroying all employ goodwill?

Jacqui Alder is a consultant with extensive and diverse experience across Human Resources, change management, organisational development and industrial relations.

Jacqui’s experience has been gained across a variety of industry sectors.

The sectors include:

Resources
Manufacturing
Transport
Government
Defence

Jacqui has had significant achievements across a range of areas, with projects including:

Organisational change
Culture change
Organisational redesign
Systems implementation
Workforce reform
Cost improvement

We asked Jacqui to share her expertise in different aspects of the difficult process of managing redundancies in the workplace.

How To Manage Redundancies

In the redundancies interview, we will take a look at:

What are the advantages and disadvantages of offering voluntary redundancies versus conducting forced redundancies/involuntary redundancies?
What are the steps involved in the redundancy process?
How to select people for involuntary redundancy?
How to communicate throughout the redundancy process?
Should you march someone out immediately when making them redundant?
How can you implement redundancies without destroying all employee goodwill?
A case study.

Log In Here To Listen To The Interview [For Free]

To listen to HRwisdom’s excellent free audio interview series on how to manage redundancies, just log in in using the following free form.

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Measuring Staff Performance – Take Out The Hassle

January 10, 2013 / HRwisdom

There is often a lot of discussion within businesses about the best methods of measuring staff performance.

The ability to develop and maintain a high-performing workforce is key to success, or even survival during economic hard times.

Today, we turn to expert HRwisdom contributor Leon Noone for some excellent advice on staff motivation.

Leon established his management consulting business in 1978. His core business is helping managers in small-medium business to improve the day to day job performance of their staff.

Leon offers you his usual straight-talking advice on how to take the hassle out of measuring staff performance.

Over to Leon . . .

Practical Performance Appraisal: Measuring Staff Performance Successfully Without Filling Out Forms

The term “performance appraisal” usually means filling out forms, reviewing employees’ work, a formal interview and planning development or remedial activities. And it’s often a hassle. It shouldn’t mean any of that.

Performance not Politeness

Formal performance appraisal systems often ask managers to comment or rate all sorts of things.

Some of these are not only difficult to judge, but have little or nothing to do with performance: demeanour, presentation, co-operation, initiative, attitude, to mention a few.

Make sure your performance appraisal is about performance – the results that the employee achieves on the job.

Performance and Behaviour

I’ve read lots of definitions of these words. The best I’ve found is this: “Performance is what you leave behind. Behaviour is what you take with you.” (Tweet this quote now)

Managers often allow employee behaviour to interfere with evaluation of their performance. When this happens, “good” behaviour often masks poor performance and “poor” behaviour overrides good performance.

A large international company once sought my advice about the behaviour of their leading salesperson.

This person had averaged more than 30% over sales budget for 3 years. But his paperwork was poor.

The company was seriously considering “letting him go” due to the poor paperwork.

I suggested that they employ someone to keep his paperwork up to date and give him more time in the field where his performance showed that he clearly excelled.

Clear Performance Standards

To measure performance you must have clear measurable performance standards.

If you don’t tell your employees exactly what performance you expect, how can you measure whether they provides it? That’s the purpose of performance standards.

You Get What You Expect

Expect the best.

Explain to employees exactly what you mean by “best” and how you’ll measure it.

Create systems to enable them to attain “best”. Do that and you’ll probably get “best” or close to it.

Fail to do it and you’ll be lucky to get third best. That’s what employees will believe you expect.

The best thing a manager can do for employees is to put systems in place that make it impossible for them to fail.

Appraisal Daily

You should be measuring employee performance at least weekly and preferably daily.

This is simple, precise and fast when you have clear, measurable performance standards.

If your standards are clear enough and your systems are sound enough, your employees will know how well they’re doing long before you do. They will measure their own performance through the system. And you’ll know too.

Stay Informed and Prepared

Good systems and clear performance standards are the cornerstones of superior staff performance.

With these in place, you’ll have ready access to the information you need to decide “how well they’re doing”.

And so will employees.

If you want to have a formal interview with an employee, you’ll have plenty of time and be well prepared.

Abandon The Appraisal Form

Filling out an elaborate form once every six or twelve months is nothing more than a bureaucratic construct created by HR specialists more interested in bureaucracy niceties than measuring performance. (Tweet this quote now)

It also requires managers to review work over an almost impossibly long time.

There’s no need for it. Stop doing it.

Use Performance Standards and Systems Instead

Today’s technology means both manager and employee can tell how well the employee is performing monthly, weekly, even daily.

Make employees responsible for measuring their own performance.

You shouldn’t have to wait six or twelve months to find out.

Conclusion

There’s no need to complete a form in order to undertake a successful performance appraisal.

In fact, filling in elaborate appraisal forms is likely to hinder rather than help successful appraisal.

Make employee performance a daily concern.

And expect the best.

How To Measure Staff Performance

Thanks to Leon for his excellent advice on how to get the best out of your employees. Such advice is well-timed as businesses face trying times as the economy continues to suffer.

We encourage you take action on Leon’s advice.

Remember, you can learn more about Leon and his excellent HR services by visiting his website here: Leon Noone.

Finally, as always, we welcome you to share this HRwisdom Blog post with your friends and colleagues.

HRwisdom

Delegating To Staff – The Four Fatal Flaws

December 11, 2012 / HRwisdom

In today’s HRwisdom Blog update we examine an issue that is crucial to optimal management performance yet is often handled in a very sub-optimal way: delegating to staff.

We are very fortunate to be able to bring your insights of special guest expert, Dave Clemens.

Dave Clemens has served as deputy financial editor of the International Herald Tribune, editor and bureau chief for Bloomberg News, and deputy bureau chief for the French News Agency.

Currently, Dave is the editor of Rapid Learning Institute’s The HR Café, an informative, entertaining blog for Human Resources Leaders.

Over to Dave . . .

Delegation: The Four Fatal Flaws That Cause New Managers to Struggle In Their New Role

Why did you get promoted to a leadership role?

When asked that question, most managers say something about deep experience in leadership or a proven track record developing people. The likelihood is that neither of these answers is true. In reality, most employees get promoted because they excel in a specific technical skill.

In promoting you to a leadership role, your organization essentially made a bet. Knowing that you can perform at a high level, it bets that given a higher salary and more responsibility, you can replicate that performance in other people.

Normally, this is a losing bet, but when it does pay off, organizations reach the Holy Grail of Delegation: The Multiplier Effect.

When leaders successfully replicate the knowledge, skills, attitudes and behaviors that made them successful – a process known as “Knowledge Transfer” – the organization gets an entire team of individuals performing at high levels. The organization also gets a leader who has the time to take on higher-level strategic activities, and make an even greater impact on organizational performance.

Now, why is this normally a losing bet? Because delegating effectively is a difficult skill to master. Many managers end up committing one of the Four Fatal Flaws of Delegation. Let’s take a look at them.

1. Misunderstanding your role.

Sometimes managers don’t understand the power of the Multiplier Effect. They think their promotion to leadership is a reward for exceptional performance. Furthermore, they think the people who now report to that manager are there to do the manager’s work and nothing else. Granted, that’s part of what delegation is about, but it isn’t the most important part.

Solution: Understand that delegation isn’t about you, but rather about your employees. Remember, the goal is to replicate your skills in other people.

2. Micromanaging

Too many managers won’t let their reports find their own path to success, and instead watch over every move employees make. The problem with this is twofold: It leaves your employees feeling disempowered and unable to take ownership of the tasks assigned to them. Second, micromanaged employees perpetually drain managers’ time, keeping them from the activities related to their new strategic role.

Solution: Recognize that good people find their own way, even if that means making mistakes along the way. As a leader, it’s your job to empower your reports to find their own solutions, not hand those solutions to them on a silver platter.

3. Lacking a plan for development.

When managers take a “sink or swim” approach to their employees, it creates a recipe for failure for both the manager and the employee.

Solution: Develop an effective development plan. That means setting a training agenda, clearly defining desired goals and outcomes for employees, and then coaching employees to help them meet those goals.

4. Assuming that delegation will lead to automatic success.

This happens when managers believe that if they were free from the low-level tasks they’re now delegating to their reports, their career will take off. In reality, the transition is rarely smooth. When that automatic success doesn’t happen, frustrated managers return to their comfort zone – operational work that other employees were taking care of. On top of demoralizing the manager, this harms reports as well, as they feel they don’t own their job anymore.

Solution: Hopefully your boss isn’t putting you into a sink or swim scenario, but if they are, seek out training. There’s no shame in admitting that management is difficult, and your boss should understand and be willing to help you transition into your new role.

About Dave Clemens

Dave Clemens has served as deputy financial editor of the International Herald Tribune, editor and bureau chief for Bloomberg News, and deputy bureau chief for the French News Agency.

Currently, Dave is the editor of Rapid Learning Institute’s The HR Café, an informative, entertaining blog for Human Resources Leaders.

Connect with Dave via Twitter @TheHRCafe