The increasing pace of change in today’s workplace has made it clear to workers of all ages they must continually improve to remain competitive. Skills that were relevant a week ago may no longer apply today. Conventional industry wisdom fluctuates every few months. Adapting and evolving are the only options, whether you’re an entry-level employee or the CEO.
But the problem facing most organizations is cost and time: How can they possibly afford to provide training for their entire organization? After all, the work still needs to get done. The solution is to turn every manager into an informal training officer by involving them in an ongoing reskilling process at every level of the organization.
Identify Goals First
The only way to manage employee improvement—whether it’s a behavior problem or a performance problem—is to find a way to monitor and measure it in concrete terms. Then the manager has a way to directly compare past performance to current performance and evaluate the difference over time. Of course, that comparison is meaningless if there is no specific goal to achieve.
Have managers ask each of their direct reports good probing questions to get at the heart of any skill gaps or deficits:
- What best practices and standard operating procedures are you currently following?
- Are there any industry standards you are aware of that you are not following? Why not?
- What apps, tools, or software would make doing your job a lot easier?
- What apps, tools, or software would make the quality of your work higher?
- What are the skills you believe will be most helpful and relevant to your work today?
- What are the skills you believe will be most helpful and relevant to your work in five years?
- What new skills will be easy for you to learn?
- What new skills will be difficult for you to learn?
- What new skills can you learn and improve on in the course of your everyday work?
- What new skills will require you to set aside special time and effort?
Managers and their employees may have to work together to find answers to these questions. It may require a little research from both parties. But if managers can identify the reskilling goals they have for each person, they will be able to create an improvement plan.
Reskill One Step at a Time
Once reskilling goals have been identified, it is time for managers and employees to develop a structured improvement plan. That plan is going to serve as both a management tool and a checklist for the employee, comprising intermediary goals along the way.
Say one of an employee’s reskilling goals is to become an expert in a new customer relationship management (CRM) platform. Start by defining what “becoming an expert” means: What does the employee need to accomplish with this new software? What problems is the new platform intended to solve? The answers to these questions will build a checklist of intermediary goals right away. Then, organize those goals into a logical order: Which goals must be accomplished first, second, third, and so on?
This process should create a robust reskilling improvement plan managers can use as a guide in the coaching-style conversations they have with each employee one-on-one.
One-on-Ones Are Where All the Action Is
Armed with a plan and actionable goals, the hope is that employees make consistent, steady improvement on their own. But the reality is that even the most self-starting, reliable employees need guidance, direction, and support in order to stay on track and do their best. That’s where the importance of regular, ongoing one-on-one meetings comes in.
There are four essential elements of good coaching-style one-on-ones:
1. Customized to the individual being coached.
Different styles of communication work for different people. Everyone has different aspects of performance that need to be focused on. They all have unique habits, wants, and needs. The most effective coaching-style managers tune in to those differences and use them as a guideline for their ongoing dialogues with each employee.
2. Focused on specific instances of individual performance.
Imagine that you are coaching a runner as they make their way down the field. If you start yelling, “Run faster! Run faster!” that probably won’t do very much to improve that person’s performance. Instead, focus on improving the specifics of a person’s performance, one step at a time: “Pull in your elbows! Tuck your chin! Lift your knees higher!” That is the type of specific, concrete feedback that can be put into action right away.
3. Describes the employee’s performance honestly and vividly.
The biggest mistake a manager can make is to hold back on feedback for the sake of preserving the employee’s feelings. Of course, managers should never belittle or bully their team members. But they should be fully honest and candid in their feedback. Describe the performance you are seeing in concrete, vivid terms. Compare that to the performance you would like to see, based on the expectations you and the employee agreed on at the beginning of the project. Of course, this only works if you are taking the time to establish those expectations from the outset.
4. Develops concrete next steps.
The worst thing any manager can do is break down all the ways an employee is doing something wrong, only to leave them hanging at the end of the conversation. Don’t leave your employees in a sink-or-swim situation. Help them develop a solid plan of concrete next steps. Strategize and plan together. Building that type of support and trust on your team cannot be overestimated.