Performance Management: How can you Encourage Poorly Performing Staff to Improve?

Schools must occasionally resort to the use of performance management processes where staff are underperforming or fail, for any reason, to conform to the school’s requirements or cultural norms. However, before we begin, it is important to get one concept clear. The main outcome of performance management should be employee improvement, not employee dismissal. Dismissal may be an eventual outcome, but except in rare circumstances, it should not be the objective.

According to the Australian Human Resources Institute (AHRI): “Performance management is a much broader concept than performance appraisal or a disciplinary process. It aims to improve organisational, functional, team and individual performances. Effective performance management measures the progress being made towards the achievement of the organisation's business objectives. It does so by planning, establishing, monitoring, reviewing and evaluating organisational, functional, team and individual performance.”

The AHRI statement highlights that both performance management and performance appraisal (which includes scheduled annual or more frequent performance review discussions between staff and their managers/ teaching supervisors)  have the same aims and can even have the same structure in terms of setting goals, monitoring and evaluating performance. However, because performance management processes have the potential to result in dismissal, school management must be conscious of the risks of unfair dismissal, adverse action, bullying,  harassment, or even discrimination claims. This means that the processes that the school follows must be able to withstand external scrutiny in terms of fairness and good faith.

Effective management of staff involves establishing a shared understanding of what is to be achieved at the school level. It is about aligning the employees' skills, competencies and development plans with the school’s objectives and cultural norms and the delivery of clearly enunciated and understood results. See our article ‘How do I create a culture of awareness? What is culture?’ regarding the development of culture in a school. In addition to policies and basic supervision, a regular performance review and feedback process is a key step in embedding and checking how well this alignment is understood and how effectively it is occurring.

The starting point for any performance management process is for some introspection: the manager or supervisor must be clear on how well the school has communicated to the employee what is expected of them: are there accurate job descriptions? Was there someone to supervise and monitor them and provide guidance to ensure they were doing what they were supposed to be doing? Has the employee received any feedback on their performance in the past? What was said at their last performance review/appraisal meeting? Have they had adequate training? Once that internal review has taken place, then a clearer (and fairer) way forward with the employee can proceed.

The Fair Work Ombudsman, which  publishes an extremely useful Best Practice Guide Managing Underperformance, makes a critical point - not all underperforming staff issues are best addressed by "performance management " processes; some matters would be more effectively addressed through more low-key alternatives such as closer supervision, feedback and monitoring in order to get the employee back on track. Formal performance management may then result if an improvement is not forthcoming.

If an employee is deemed to be underperforming to the extent that a school determines that a formal performance management process is warranted, there are several measures that should be taken, as the actual mechanics are where the school's high-risk actions begin.

1. Clearly identify the areas or issues where the employee is underperforming. What evidence do you have? Can you clearly articulate what the employee should be doing differently?
2. Check any procedural requirements which may be set out in the relevant award, enterprise agreement and any relevant school policies.
3. Arrange the first meeting with the employee - advising the employee beforehand that the meeting is to discuss his or her performance. When arranging the meeting, the employee should be advised beforehand in writing (letter or email) and the correspondence should include at least the following:

• Where relevant, the reasons for the identification of the poor performance- for example, regularly failing to arrive at work on time and therefore failing to provide sufficient duty of care or failing to follow school policies.
• The time and location of the meeting.
• The attendees at the meeting.
• The employee’s right to bring a ‘support person’ to the meeting if they so desire. This is not the same as a union representative or lawyer, but someone who is essentially there to provide support and witness; this is a non-speaking role unless the enterprise agreement or award stipulates a different process.

1. Prior to the meeting, it is recommended that the employer has a list of all issues and the evidence of same and ‘scripts’ out the basic meeting format.
2. The issues of concern should be presented clearly to the employee at the meeting. The employee must be given the opportunity to respond to each issue or be given time to do so - another meeting may have to be scheduled to allow for this. The evidence needs to be clear and specific with dates, times and any other facts apparent. It is very important to avoid generalisations such as, ‘You have a poor attitude’. Attitude cannot be taken to court unless you can provide specific examples and how the employee is expected to behave differently.
3. At the commencement of the meeting, all attendees should be introduced (do not ‘stack’ the meeting with several executive staff) and the role of the support person should be defined. Usually, this role is non-verbal. Giving them the task of ‘taking the notes’ (not minutes), is a strategy that may be effective. The notes must be collected and filed after the meeting, although it is recommended that a school representative other than the one conducting the meeting should also take notes.
4. At the conclusion of the meeting, it is essential to summarise the outcomes, outline what will happen next and advise that the outcomes will be confirmed in writing. Having the employee paraphrase some of the issues may be of benefit, however, this should not be condescending. Where the employee has raised matters that need to be considered further, this step should be taken after the second meeting.
5. Once the employer has heard and considered the employee’s responses to the issues, the employer needs to outline the steps to be taken to rectify the problems, a time frame, a standard that must be met and the  consequences if they are not fixed. Basically, the employee should know:

• What is wrong.
• What they need to do to remedy the problem.
• What additional support the school may provide, such as mentoring, or further training.
• The time frame to remedy the problem and a next review date.
• The consequences of failing to resolve the issues.
• That there will be a letter to follow that summarises the expected outcomes and that it will be a formal warning, with a copy placed on the employee’s personnel file.

The letter (not an email) should follow the meeting within 24-48 hours. This ensures that the employee is aware that consideration has been given to his or her responses and that the outcome of the meeting had not been ‘pre-ordained.’ It is also important that the employee is advised that if their performance does not improve within the specified time frame, then their continued employment with the school may be in jeopardy.

This process may need to be repeated several times over a reasonable time frame. Each time the employee needs to be given time to review and respond to any issues raised. The employee needs to be given opportunities to improve through mentorship, professional development opportunities, agreed changes to their duties and genuine support from the school executive or management.

As a risk management measure, it is critical that the school keeps accurate and contemporaneous records of all agreements, meetings and interactions.

A fair and transparent performance management process should emphasise improvement, learning and development in order to achieve the overall school strategy. It should also be based on several very clear premises:

• The school has a clearly defined and well-understood culture and a published and accepted vision and mission.
• The school has policies and a Staff Code of Conduct in place to ensure that the vision and the mission are enacted by all employees within the parameters of the school’s culture.
• All staff know, understand and accept the Staff Code of Conduct and the requirements of these policies.