Start easy for your first employee performance review

When scheduling your employee performance reviews, the temptation is to start with the person you have been itching to tell exactly what you think of them. This is the absolute worst thing you can do!

Always start your employee performance reviews with the easiest person to review. That way you will reduce your nerves, get comfortable with the process and build your skills during the review. Generally if you get on really well with the person, at the end of the review you can ask for feedback on your own performance as a reviewer. This will further help you build your skills.

Work up to the harder reviews – especially the ones that give you sweaty palms just thinking about them.

For the sweaty palm reviews spend time working out possible scenarios as to how they may play out and what you may say. Practice with a trusted colleague or your human resource manager – do a few dummy runs. You want to create a reflex reaction so if a particular response arises then you can deal with it quickly and efficiently.

If you have any reason to believe the person has the potential for violence, your safety is paramount. This doesn’t mean ignore the review, it means take steps to minimise any potential risk to yourself and other people. We will talk more about this in a future post.

Until next time

Ingrid Cliff

Heart Harmony – Human Resource Copywriters

Putting your business into words