Why You Should Build Your Core Values into Your Performance Management Process

The performance management process often gets a bad rap. In fact, only 55 percent of employees feel performance appraisals are effective.

But it doesn’t have to be this way. Performance management can be so much more than filling out paperwork and awkwardly chatting with employees once a year. By centering your performance management process around your company’s core values, you can create a more rewarding and valuable experience for all involved.

Curious about how to make that happen? Here are three steps to integrating your core values into the performance management process:

1. Communicate Clearly

First, it is important that both you and your employees completely understand what your company values actually are. Don’t assume everyone is on the same page: In one survey, 61 percent of employees said they didn’t know their company’s mission statement. You can’t expect employees to perform adequately if they don’t even know what they’re striving after.

Communicating to employees what your company stands for will help them set expectations for their behaviors at work. The better your employees understand the company values, the more connected they will feel to the organization – which leads to increased loyalty and productivity.

2. Translate Values Into Behaviors

Once everyone has a clear understanding of what the company values consist of, you need to consider how those values can be translated into behaviors. What do your values actually look like in action?

Just as importantly, behavioral standards need to be adjusted for each separate team and department. You can’t rate a developer and a customer service rep according to the same rubric when their everyday task loads are so different.

Just 4 percent of HR leaders  believe they effectively and accurately assess employee performance. Addressing this matter requires connecting values to employees’ roles in meaningful ways. It would be wise to meet with employees to get an understanding of what they do every day and what they feel they should be evaluated on.

3. Give Feedback Regularly

Sixty-five percent of employees say they’d like to receive more feedback – and a values-based performance management process requires such frequent feedback. In values-based performance management, the focus is on employees’ daily behaviors and their connections to company values. As such, performance conversations must occur on a regular and more frequent basis so that behaviors can be realigned in real time.

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Are your company values in tune with your performance management process? If not, it’s time to fix that. A values-based performance management process will result in a more productive, engaged, and loyal workplace.

A version of this article originally appeared on the iRevü blog.

Michael Heller is the CEO and founder of iRevü.