Businesses in Dubai and all around the UAE are proactively seeking ways to improve productivity and employee efficiency. The market is very competitive and the customer’s expectation are high. In such situation it is crucial to perform well at all touch points to make sure the customer have satisfactory experience. Apart from customer satisfaction, the businesses also need to improve performance in other functions such as production, finance, purchase & supply chain, HR, etc. That is why the employee KPIsand performance management system is critical. Moreover businesses are always seeking ways to prepare themselves for the disruptive events and unprecedented scenarios. The performance management system gets them ready by highlighting their capabilities. Businesses also need to solve the problems and obstacles that their employees are facing on daily bases. By rectifying the most obvious problems, an enterprise or organization can gain significant boost in the employee performance.
The performance management system is crucial for any business or organization to achieve its long term goals. These goals are flown from top to bottom and dictates individual, team and department goals which altogether contributes to achieve the organizational goals and objectives. The goals and objectives often interchanged however, they are entirely different. The goals are a stated in broader terms, set for longer period of time and also influenced by the vision and mission of the business. For example the goal of a business could be to become the number 1 service provider in the UAE. That is a goal and it is not quantifiable. However, in order to achieve this goal the objectives are set such as to achieve raise in customer satisfaction by 20%, customer retention by 15% and customer churn rate should be reduced by 30%, and all these goals are quantifiable.
Similarly these goals are propagated downwards to the individual employees and the teams. Hence the KPI or Key Performance Indicators are set accordingly. These KPIs will measure the actual and precise amount of growth and progress towards the individual and high-level organizational goals and objectives. The KPIs are a critical part of the performance management.
Importance of Employee KPIs in Improving the Performance
For any business the employees are the greatest asset, it is not only about hiring the right people but it is also about putting them in right places where they can perform well and groom to raise their level of expertise and skills, in order to enhance their performance over the time. That is why it is absolutely necessary for any business to have high performing employees. That is why the employee KPIs are also crucial for business success. A business’s success is a very broader term, it is measured with so many different scales and matrices. However, for any business their success is to achieve their high-level organization goals and objectives. The employee KPIs help managers to obtain higher performance form the available resources to maximize the efficiency which results in success and is considered a key to get desired results. For any business the simplest form to achieve their goals is to simply maximize the performance and minimize the operational cost. Which is only possible when the employees are working at their maximum potential and are able to produce the desired or expected outcomes.
The KPIs can not only simplify the evaluation process but it also help businesses in measuring and monitoring both the quality of the work and the quantity of the work as well. The KPIs can be implemented using a performance management system or software, which not only measures the KPIs but also automates the process of collecting the data and on top of that it also allow the managers to easy analyze the data and prepare actionable reports from it. This way the managers can easily learn about the strengths and weaknesses of the employees, they can train them, encourage them or motivate them to boost their performance. Furthermore the employee KPIs are also used for self-assessment, which also increase competitiveness and motivate the employees. That is why the employee KPIs are so crucial for achieving the high performance from the employees which is a key to long term success.
Employee Performance Management System
The employee performance management is totally different from just taking a few KPIs. In fact the KPIs are just a part of the overall organizational performance management. The performance management’s primary goal is to increase employee engagements and build a strong relationship between the employees and the business and higher management. It gives employee confidence, it motivates them and it boost their moral which results in higher performance. The employee performance management is a very complex and lengthy process which is being executed over a longer period of time to gradually enhance the employee performance and improve the overall productivity of the business. Measuring all those matrices manually and collecting that much of data is not possible. That is why businesses and organizations use Performance Management Software, or Enterprise Performance Management Systems. The Performance Management System or Software is integrated with different enterprise systems and business tools, in fact it is linked with the central information center of the organization which allow it to gather performance data and measure all sorts of matrices, KPIs, OKRs, and other performance indicators.
Here are some key features of a performance management system:
- The user interface and user experience of the system should be very customer friendly
- The system should have in-built templates and helping materials to help management with initial set up
- The entire operation should be automated, the data integration and even the basic level of analytical process should be done automatically to facilitate the users
- The features to aid the employee performance management process and support both employees and the managers with communication, interactions and meetings
- Features to easily set up goals and objectives and ability to blend and modify goals during the performance management cycle
- Highly customizable and intuitive feedback collection module to aid, upward, downward, or peer to peer feedback
- Data sharing, distribution and protection features to allow easy access to the data and to prevent the sensitive data from unnecessary exposure
- Comprehensive features to aid data analytical, historical stats analysis, comparison and other data processing techniques
- Flexible design and scalable infrastructure to support customization, upgrade, and scalability in future
These are some key components of a performance management system. There are several off-the-shelf employee performance management systems and tools branded with different names. However, we always suggest our employees to go for a customized or tailor-made performance management system. Because the customized tool can provide more accurate data and can be very helpful for the users which also enhance the efficiency of the system.
Employee Performance Management Process
The employee performance management process begins with communicating the job roles of the employees. This will tell them what they should do and what the business is expecting from them to deliver. The job role is the day-to-day tasks which require a certain level of competencies both technical and behavioral competencies. The next step of the performance management process is to set quantifiable/measurable, specific, achievable, realistic, and time bound. These goals will then communicated with the managers, H.O.D.s, Line Managers and other senior staff. That top level and senior management then define goals and set up KPIs. Basically the very first step of an employee performance management process is planning. The HR and/or the senior managers sit together, they set the high-level organizational goals, then they set the goals for teams and departments and then they set individual goals.
When employees are also engaged in setting goals and making pans their feedback is taken, they feel more empowered and connected to the business. It also give them a sense of personal attachment with the goal and in such situations people tend to perform well. By increasing employee engagements businesses can boost their performance and it also help improving employee retention rates too. Employee engagement is crucial for improving the performance. The feedback is a very important factor in performance management. The employees who receive feedback at least once in a week from the manager are tend to show performance improvement of 8% to 15%. The performance management is not a one-time job, it is a continuous process and it keep improving the employees and their performance. Here is a quick summary of how the performance management starts:
Set Goals and Objectives
The goals and objectives are the most important part of performance management, if the goals and objectives will be realistic and achievable they will encourage employees to perform better to achieve those goals. The high-level organizational goals and objectives are set as per the mission and vision of the business. Then the strategy and planning department make plans to achieve those targets. The same goals and objectives further divided into department, teams and then the individual goals as well. There are several different methods followed to build goals and demands however, the most commonly known methodologies for goals and objectives are SMART and 5As.
Strategy and Planning
The goals are based on the vision, desire, projection and expectations, however, the goals doesn’t define themselves and doesn’t tell how business can and should achieve them. For that businesses made strategy and plans. For example if the goal of the business is to become the number one service provider in their niche. Then they need a strategy and a plan to become the top leader in the market. For example, the business might need 30% increase in the customer satisfaction, in order to achieve that 30% the business will have to improve the service delivery process, the customer waiting experience and the customer sales staff and a lot many other things. That is how the strategy and plans are built. The same applied to the departments, teams and even individual employees as well.
Set Up KPIs and Performance Matrices
Once the strategy and plan is made, the management should set measuring matrices and performance indicators which will tell how successful or unsuccessful the business was during the performance cycle. There are several different types of the performance matrices however, here are the few most commonly used performance matrices:
- Key Performance Indicator – KPI
- Key Responsibility Areas – KRA
- Objective and Key Results – OKR
- Balanced Score Card – BSCs
Businesses can easily measure and monitor performance at any level using the above mentioned matrices. The KPI or Key Performance Indicator is the most widely used performance indicator.
Real-time Monitoring
The best thing about a performance management system is that it enable businesses to monitor performance in real-time. The managers can monitor the performance of their subordinates in real-time. Which provide them advantage of making quick adjustments, make course corrections and prepare for the unexpected scenarios. As soon as an employee deviates from their expected path, or their performance slows down, the manager can immediately know about it. This provide enough space for the manager to take appropriate action to resolve the problems and to boost the performance. The employee performance management system also enable the management to effectively and efficiently handle unexpected situations and identify the areas of improvement. This help businesses in dealing with the challenges employees are facing and also help businesses gain their trust.
Conclusion
Businesses in Dubai and all around the UAE are facing several challenges which require them to perform at maximum operational efficiency to ensure customer satisfaction and cost-effectiveness. The employee KPI or key performance indicators are used to measure the performance of the employee, the performance management system is used to deal with challenges and obstacles your employees are facing on daily bases. The main objective is to increase employee engagements, boost communication and encourage feedbacks. The performance management system is capable of monitoring employees directly and it can also be linked with other enterprise systems and solutions. The main objective of the performance management system is to effectively communicate the job role, individual & high-level goals and closely monitor the performance of the employees. This can significantly boost the performance of the businesses. RSI Concepts is a leading name in Employee Performance Management System (EPMS), if you need any help or want to learn more about the subject, please feel free to contact us through our Contact Us page or leave a comment in the comment box below and we will get in touch with you soon.
Check out this: Digital Branch Transformation Trends for Banks in 2022