Running an efficient workplace starts by knowing your employees’ capabilities and shortcomings. Observation can give you some idea, but you’ll still miss the complete picture. Unless you spend considerable time with each team member, it’s impossible to get a good read on their performance. It’s also not practical.

Instead, you can depend on employee performance management solutions that give you key data points to understand your employees’ weaknesses and strengths. The right kind of performance management (EPM) solution can add value to your company.

Here’s how you can unlock your team’s potential with EPM:

1. Recognize your employees for their performance

An employee performance management solution can give autonomy to employees. They can see their progress and how they can achieve long-term goals.

When you see an employee perform better, you can recognize and reward them. If they lack somewhere, constructive feedback can help them improve their performance. Forward-looking management can use this software to identify employees’ strengths and boost their productivity.

When management can examine individual employee data, they can find areas where a particular employee excels. This enables managers to place the right employees on the right teams or projects to boost results. Similarly, if an employee isn’t working at par with their colleagues, they can be trained or motivated to perform better. When employees feel that their work is being appreciated, they will show better performance.

2. Provide regular feedback

Performance management software can give continuous feedback in real-time. This allows management to engage employees irrespective of geographical barriers. Regular feedback helps employees perform according to the standard that’s expected of them. Instead of receiving feedback upon project completion, they can receive feedback when they’re working, which can help them achieve a better outcome.

However, make sure you use a positive tone when giving feedback. A negative attitude or harsh tone can lower employee morale and further decline the performance of an employee.

Modern companies no longer depend on annual performance appraisals. Instead, they can evaluate performance on an ongoing basis. This saves a lot of time for management as well. Employees can get regular guidance and coaching to help them work more efficiently.

3. Help them develop professionally

There are some employee performance management solutions that also help to facilitate employee professional development. With an EPM solution, you can plan career development training to your employees to help them advance in their careers. When they find permanent careers in your organization, they’ll be motivated to do their best work.

Make sure to share professional development data with your employees so they can select their ideal career path in your organization.

With the help of performance management tools, you can identify employee goals and help them stay focussed. When they achieve their targets, they can be rewarded for using simpler processes or for their fast performance. This way, employees can achieve company, departmental, and individual goals in a better way.

4. Find the strengths of interns

Many companies hire interns that often turn into full-time employees. To ensure that you get the right people working in the right department, you can evaluate data from your performance management software.

Interns can join different training programs and can be assigned to different departments or roles according to their skillset, not necessarily based solely on their educational background. For example, someone with a degree in social work might perform well in accounting and thus find a rewarding career path.

Managers can map interns with the skillsets needed for a particular job and then assign tasks to them accordingly. This will streamline processes and help interns excel in their work and grow in the organization.

5. Manage problem employees

All organizations have faced the issue of problem employees. Whether they’re notorious for their constantly poor performance or for not getting along with others, there’s an urgent need to address them.

The first instinct after getting feedback from performance management software should be to provide guidance and coaching to these employees. However, if a particular employee is failing at all tasks repeatedly, it might be best to place them on a different project or team. Without a reliable performance management system, it will be hard to identify such workers.

Employees who consistently fail to improve can drag the rest of the team down. It’s important to locate truly poor performing employees so the bottom line can be improved.

6. Work towards the future

The old method of performance evaluation often relied on obsolete and irrelevant data that didn’t accurately measure employee productivity. Automated performance measurement solutions, on the other hand, provide valuable data in real-time so you can always gauge employee performance across your organization and take action when needed.

With precise results from performance measurement solutions, it’s easier to decide on promotions and employee development. In the long run, managers can measure employee competence and set goals for their projects and tasks.

Employees can also set their own appraisal or promotion goals within pre-defined parameters, which gives them more control over their career paths. Companies such as Argano can help you deploy a futuristic performance management solution that integrates with other essential software, such as accounting and HR software, to support your business.

7. Plan more focused meetings

While regular meetings are held to increase productivity, they can lead to a waste of time if not carefully chalked out. When employees start losing interest in meetings, it can lead to a decline in their efficiency.

With an automated employee performance management solution, meetings can be documented and progress can be recorded. It becomes easier to keep notes that everyone can access. It’s easier to identify obstacles and bottlenecks in a particular project. Management can also follow up with employees regarding their progress.

A good performance management system will help you auto-schedule your meetings according to the goals being met every day. This will help you keep track of the updates, and you can discuss the next steps in the meetings. Since employee progress will already be in front of you, you can now create the next action plan instead of detailing what has already been done.

Final Thoughts

You can unlock your team’s potential with innovative employee performance management solutions. This makes HR more employee-centric. It bridges the gaps in performance and gives advantages to the company as well as the employees.