Leverage Your People (OPINION)

In recent articles, I have discussed improving the performance of executives and middle managers.

There are also concrete ways to improve profits with employees. Every CEO and manager is focused on getting the right people on board, and what follows are important tactics to utilize with the team members you choose.

Analyze job performance: For each person and position, create a chart that lists the name of the incumbent, what needs to be accomplished, what’s actually occurring and what isn’t happening. This identifies performance gaps and helps you decide how best to bridge them.

Ask yourself if the performance gaps truly need to be accomplished, and if this is the right position to accomplish them. With coaching, can the incumbent achieve the needed results? Often a number of expectations for given roles are outdated. Make sure you focus on what really matters in each role.

Focus on strengths: Why not restructure your jobs to focus on each employee’s strengths? You may have talented people who are in the wrong positions, or people who are fantastic at two-thirds of their job description but not the other third. In the latter case, most companies create corrective action plans to have employees “overcome” their weakness.

That’s one reason I don’t like job descriptions. They don’t focus on people’s strengths. If Joseph is world-class at the majority of his job description, but average or not very effective at other parts, why not change the job description so Joseph can do what he does best all the time and have someone else do what Joseph will never do well?

Identify high-value actions: Sometimes, people are busy working on tasks that aren’t very important, or that were important once but now are not. Your job is to continually redefine what the most valuable tasks (and results) are and outsource, delegate, automate or eliminate the tasks that are not providing high value.

Have employees list the 10 things they spend the most time on and rate those items high to low, based on how much value they add. I have done this exercise with numerous teams, and invariably only two or three items are really high value generators. Most everything else can be eliminated.

Overhaul processes: People can be focused on the right things but taking four times longer to do it than necessary if they’re using antiquated processes. Actively question your current processes in light of available technology, people and customer experience. There is always a better way.

Outside experts with fresh sets of eyes can help because they are not biased to your processes.

Align incentives: Are you incentivizing the right behaviors and actions? Is your incentive plan doing what you want it to do?  Like the most important tasks, sometimes our incentive plans are focused on what was important yesterday but not on what makes customers loyal today. Make sure your incentives encourage employees to follow your strategy, brand promise, and create an excellent customer experience.

Unleash thought leaders: The answers to many of your company’s most challenging issues walk in the door every day and leave at night. Are you turning them loose to solve critical problems, or are their jobs so consuming that they have no time to innovate?

Find time for employees to form cross-functional innovation groups and give them key problems to solve. If you’re streamlining your jobs so they do the most important tasks and eliminate or reduce time spent on low value tasks, you will free up time for your employees to do this. 

Talented, engaged employees are crucial to your success, but more than 70 percent of American workers are disengaged. These six tactics, while not exhaustive, can dramatically increase your profitability and help your employees perform better and enjoy their jobs more. 

Scott McClymonds is the founder of Fayetteville-based strategic consulting firm CEO Velocity. His expertise integrating leadership, strategic marketing and technology builds competitive advantages for his clients. He can be reached at [email protected].