How to Have Effective Performance Conversations: A Guide for Managers
In my last post I said I would come back to performance conversations and practical leadership tools. This is that post. It comes out of a conversation with Greg Harford on the Canberra Business Podcast.
Why do performance problems turn into workplace disputes?
Most of the conflict I am called into assist in resolving did not start as a dispute. A lot of what arrives as a mediation problem began as a management one. A conversation that never happened. Feedback that was never specific. A performance discussion held once a year, because the calendar said so.
Performance feedback is not an annual event. It is something managers do constantly.
Here is the framework I use and teach for any performance discussion. Prepare, discuss, record, reflect.
How do you prepare for a performance conversation?
Failing to prepare is preparing to fail.
Be clear about what you want from the conversation. Bring an agenda. Bring specific examples: a piece of work, a contribution to a project, how the person handled a working relationship.
Think about where you will hold it, when, and how. Time of day matters more than most people expect.
How do you run the discussion?
Make it a dialogue, not a monologue.
Have your agenda, but do not steamroll through it. Be curious. If someone is not meeting your expectations, find out why before you decide what it means.
There is a principle in employment law worth holding onto here. Reasonable management directions, given in a reasonable way.
And no surprises. Nobody should be pulled into a performance discussion with no idea what is coming.
Why should you record what was agreed?
This is the step busy leaders skip.
They prepare well. They have a good discussion. Then nothing gets written down.
Document what was agreed and send it to the person. It takes minutes, and it is the difference between a conversation and an outcome.
What should you do after a hard conversation?
Ask yourself two questions. What went well? What would I do differently next time?
Then there is the part that rarely makes it into a framework. What are you doing for yourself afterwards? Who can you talk to, given it is confidential? Does your organisation have an employee assistance program you could actually book, rather than a card with a 1300 number on it?
Plenty of workplaces pay lip service to this. The ones that do it well make it normal.
What if an employee won't accept feedback?
Feedback reluctance is real, and I run an exercise on it in workshops.
It is not only negative feedback either. Some people do not want positive feedback. My father's generation would say that is what I am paid to do, I do not need the fluffy stuff.
A few things help.
Normalise it. Performance discussions are part of the job, and ideally that sits in the position description.
Remove the surprise. Send the agenda ahead.
Do not demand an answer on the spot. If someone is shutting down on one topic, move to another. Then say: I know I have raised that issue, have a think about it and we can talk next week.
There is no single answer. But there are techniques, and all of them beat avoidance.
What if the manager is the one avoiding the conversation?
Sometimes the reluctance belongs to the manager.
I have seen workplaces where the staff are effectively running the section, because the manager avoids hard conversations. They are called difficult conversations for a reason. Avoiding one does not make it go away. It makes it someone else's problem, later and usually bigger.
Why does this matter for psychosocial safety?
Employers have a positive duty to eliminate or minimise psychosocial hazards at work. I covered what that means in my earlier post on resolving disputes early.
These skills sit upstream of all of it. Most of the disputes I am asked to mediate could have been a conversation six months earlier.
Where should you start?
If there is a conversation you have been putting off, that is usually the signal.
Leadership and conflict coaching works on exactly this. Preparing for the conversation, having it, and debriefing afterwards. Where a working relationship has already broken down, workplace mediation may be the better fit.
The first conversation is always free.
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