Effective communication for improving team performance

I attended an excellent course recently run by Cambridge Leadership. The key thing the course teaches you is that most people do not communicate in a way that is likely to get results when they are trying to correct underperformance. Managers either dress the criticism up with some praise e.g. “you’ve always done such good work, but you really need to improve in this area” or they just openly criticise. Neither way is the most likely to get the desired result, but obviously works in a number of cases.

The key thing you need to do is to get the person to accept that their performance was not up to scratch, and to do that you need to also make sure that it really was sub-standard. Once they accept that they have underperformed, you can start a productive discussion on how to sort it out.

The mental tool they suggest is to frame the meeting as follows.

1. Do not start with anything other than the problem issue. State the problem clearly, and explain why you think it is a problem. This is done in the following way: “It seems to me that you are not achieving {whatever it is}, because I have noticed /heard/been informed {whatever your evidence is}”.

2. Make sure the stakes are clear. Is this something that if they do not correct will affect their ability to stay in the job? Will it affect pay rises or performance bonuses? If the person does not understand why they need to improve, they won’t try that hard.

3. Ask them what they think about what you have just said, and listen properly. If they have reasons that would excuse the poor performance, then fine. If not, and if they do not say that they accept that what they did was less than what was expected, you need to start again at 1. and make it clear why you still think it is their responsibility.

4. Once they have accepted responsibility, then ask them how they plan to get back on track. It is much more effective if they come up with the plan than if you impose it on them

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