Performance Management Resolutions that Managers and HR Should Strive to Keep
Uncategorised January 25, 2012 0

Performance Management Resolutions that Managers and HR Should Strive to Keep

resolutionsThree important technology trends left their mark on the world of human resource management in 2011, and all three are poised to gather even more strength during 2012. Each trend brings a corresponding set of recommendations for managers and HR professionals in almost every field. If you keep only three New Year’s resolutions this year, these should probably have a place on your list.

Trend #1: The rise of offsite data management and software as a service (SaaS) provision for HR

Call it cloud computing, offsite enterprise resource planning, application service provision, or whatever you like. But no matter the terminology you use, HR data management and software applications are moving offsite. For a flat, manageable fee, most software service providers can help companies manage their data and systems with high processing capacity and low risk. This year, if you haven’t conducted a thorough review of your software capabilities and found a way to access vital software and applications using the cloud (an offsite service provider), it’s time to start. Make sure your applications are up to date, and find a provider that can take care of your infrastructure so you don’t have to.

Trend #2: Social media is real, and it’s here to stay

Experts are beginning to agree: Social media is actually a thing. It’s not just for kids, and it’s taking on a powerful, if not vital, role in staffing and hiring efforts across a wide range of industries. If you’re still conducting your recruitment process without any attention to social media, it’s time for a change. This does not mean screening potential candidates by looking at their Facebook pages. It does mean using Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin to gain a wide and targeted audience for job postings and bolster your company’s workplace brand.

Trend #3: Strong HR efforts are founded on strong data

More than ever, HR efforts are driven by reliable data. Effective human resource management will always acknowledge an unquantifiable element of human nature, but most HR managers now know that strong data means better planning, better control, and higher productivity. The right software applications and data gathering tools, like CRG emPerform, can help you get ahead and stay ahead when it comes to staffing, evaluations, and policy development.

How Is Your Company Tracking Its Biggest Expense – People?
Other Blogs... January 16, 2012 0

How Is Your Company Tracking Its Biggest Expense – People?

How is your Company tracking its biggest expense people

How are you tracking and optimizing your biggest expense? More than a third of organizational costs are associated with employee compensation and training – and yet few organizations are properly tracking the return on their largest investment. Now more than ever, executives are working with HR to build a stronger workforce and a healthier bottom line.

  • it is estimated that only 59% of employee work-time is productive due to lack of management and clear objectives
  • at a minimum, turnover costs an average of 25% of an employee’s salary – and this figure can be upwards of 400% of a senior executive’s salary
  • the average organization is forfeiting over $1 million per year in untapped potential

It’s time to get strategic about performance management, especially when technology exists that aligns, develops, rewards, and retains employees for increased performance, better decision making, and clear insight into the execution of organizational objectives.

Imagine being able to see the performance health of your entire organization by simply clicking a button. Imagine being able to execute a proper pay-for-performance program. Imagine knowing who your future leaders are today so that you can plan for the future. Imagine being able to develop and retain a workforce of top-performers that will give your company an edge – emPerform does that and so much more!

emPerform’s online talent management suite includes the tools needed to go beyond appraisals to automate and streamline performance management; including:

Start measuring today – click here to request a free, no obligation demo of emPerform or contact us for pricing.

Reviewing New Employees: Giving Valuable Feedback Using Minimal Data
Uncategorised January 6, 2012 0

Reviewing New Employees: Giving Valuable Feedback Using Minimal Data

Annual review season is in full swing, and most of the experienced managers and long term employees on your staff have been through the process before and know exactly what’s expected of them. Self-evaluations are being typed up and edited as we speak. And managers are looking out over their flocks of direct reports, assessing the progress of each individual, choosing coaching strategies, and coming up with ways to reward top performers.

But what about those mysterious entities, those blank slates with no clear record of accomplishment or struggle and no documented performance issues of any kind?

New employees who have been on board for fewer than six months can be challenging to evaluate, but managers dismiss these challenges at their peril. The first review can have a defining impact on an employee’s relationship with a company, and even if your managers have nothing to say, they’d better come up with something fast, and they’d better recognize that the stakes may be higher this year than they’ll ever be in the future.

Tact and foresight will play key roles during a new employee evaluation. Remember that the company may see the new hire as probationary, but the employee likely views the company in the same light. If she’s criticized more harshly than she expects, or confronted with drummed up negatives as well as positives because the protocol requires a balance, this may sow seeds of demotivation that can be hard to weed out later. By the same token, praising her wildly for showing up every morning may give her a false sense of her manager’s expectations.

Most of the time, employee reviews are based on a set of relatively objective truths, and the truth can free a manager from some of the human emperformuncertainty involved in effective coaching, discipline and motivation. But new employees come with very few objective truths. So you’ll need to make the most of every performance metric you’re able to gather.  Your review software can help. Choose a system, like CRG emPerform, that can help you collect and analyze data points across a wide variety of objective criteria. Start the analytic and record keeping process the day the employee joins the firm, and a few weeks or months down the road, you’ll be ready for a review that’s data-rich, productive, and meaningful.