Your proposal

Define your context

At this stage, you need to have a look at anything in the broader context that will affect what you do in your new performance management system. For example, if your industry has very high risks of some kind, you will need to be very intolerant of risky behavior. Consider these questions:

1. What particular needs does your organization have in its performance management system?
2. Are there any particular contractual obligations that affect performance management?
3. What particular legislative requirements apply to your organization’s performance management system?
4. Is your organization going through any particular changes that will affect your organization’s performance management system?
5. Does your organization have any policies that affect what you can do in a performance management system?
6. Do your training people want to be able to use your records as evidence of competence? In some organizations, the records must be good enough to be used as evidence for assessment of students to gain for further qualifications. In this case, performance management records might also be aligned with external competency standards.

 

Consult the stakeholders

Start by identifying significant stakeholders and creating a simple system of consulting them. Many of them will need to get particular results out of the system. Many of them might not know what they want but will have a clear opinion of your proposal afterward.

Find out who are the stakeholders that need to agree to your system (e.g. your supervisor, the HR manager, the board).

Consult them to find out what they expect of your system. They might have particular goals or expect particular kinds of results. Some will try to control your whole review process and some might want to minimize their involvement. Stakeholders often have competing interests so you will need to resolve any conflicts and negotiate solutions.

Involve key stakeholders in establishing and agreeing on performance standards. In many cases, this might be simple, but could be quite challenging if your organization has severe problems with poor performance.

Almost all stakeholders will have limited time, so get best value for their time. Keep the number of meetings to a minimum and have clear agendas. A face-to-face meeting will probably work better as many people will tell you things orally that they would not put in writing. Listen carefully to their advice, and ask follow-up questions.

You will have to evaluate what they say. For example, some might have very low expectations of performance management if they are accustomed to treating it as a formality. On the other hand, they might have unrealistically high hopes of what it might achieve.

 

Draft a proposal for your new system

It is your job to write the draft proposal but you should do so in consultation with key stakeholders.

Write your proposal. It needs to be complete enough for people to accept and brief enough for them to bother reading. If it gets too long, focus their reading on what is really important. Put an "Executive summary" at the front, keep to the point in the body of the text, put in clear section headings, include helpful diagrams, and move boring lists, raw data, and supporting documents to the appendices.

Your proposal need to be factual and realistic, but also needs to include good reasons why decision-makers should accept it. Generally speaking, they will probably accept it if you can demonstrate the following:

• You have considered your organization’s bigger picture. Many good proposals get rejected because they don’t consider bigger picture issues that are relevant to decision-makers’ decision to approve the proposal. For example, integrate performance management with other key HR functions and areas, and link the system to your organization’s operating context and strategic direction.
• You have consulted all key stakeholder and gained their approval.
• It will build organizational capability. Put this in dollar value, for example, being able to take on better projects in the future.
• It will reduce costs and increase profitability. Put current costs of poor performance in dollar values and set realistic improvement targets. Show value for money for the time invested in the changes.
• It is within your means to actually implement it. Show how you will implement the system. You will probably need to set a realistic timeline with a set of milestones.

Quite frankly, if you have firm figures showing that your system will show a strong dollar return and will have no negative side-effects, the decision-makers would usually be foolish to reject it.

In your proposal:

• Incorporate principles of natural justice, equity and fairness.
• Include key elements in the framework, eg. your organization’s culture, reward and recognition strategies, professional development strategy, career management strategies, under-performance policy, grievances).
• During this stage, you’ll also need to add OHS and factors such as planning, measurement, reviews and appraisals, monitoring, evaluation, feedback, coaching, performance agreements, learning and development plans.

Check that your proposal covers the key points:

• Does the system build organizational capability?
• Does it focus staff efforts on achieving your organization’s strategic and operational goals?
• Does it monitor employee performance?
• Does it build their morale?
• Does it have a way to create career pathways for them (professional development, promotion, etc.)?
• Does it have an option to revise job descriptions when necessary?

If your organization is small and the system is very simple, you could write the procedures at this stage and include them as an appendix to your proposal. You could have a simple form with step-by-step instructions at the top. An intelligent person should be able to read and use it easily and effectively with little training. Then have a simple way of using the form, filing it, and leading to the next periodical review.

 

Get your proposal approved

Getting approval will be easier if you have consulted the right people and written a good proposal. You might also be asked to give an oral presentation. Treat it as a good opportunity and practive it wll. Use visual aids (e.g. Powerpoint) to illustrate your points.