We are all aware of performance views by now and what they entail. Your organization's goals, team members' development, and the leader themselves are all fair game in an effective review. But your organization is constantly growing, changing, and evolving — it's not practical to create the same plan every 90 or 60 days. As a leader, how can you help others succeed and develop while impacting the culture of your organization?
Review planning is often overlooked in organizations as leaders, managers, and supervisors are busy focusing on the work that's most essential to their success. It doesn’t have to be this way. In fact, ongoing review planning for your leaders is essential to organizational productivity and growth. When you implement an investment plan for reviewing your leaders' future potential, you will see a positive impact on your team's efficiency and performance throughout the organization.
What Is A Review Plan?
According to recent findings from a study conducted by the Center for Creative Leadership, 88% of leaders fail in their first 18 months. That's a scary statistic and should be enough to convince most leaders that before they assume their new roles, they need a structured review plan.
Review plans help new leaders in your organization understand what behaviors you want them to achieve and how you want them to achieve them. By writing out a review plan, you can help:
- Give clear expectations upfront
- Ensure all employees are reviewed consistently
- Ensure that your review plan includes all the key areas of a performance review
What To Cover In Review Plans
I'm sure you've heard the saying, “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail.” That is especially true in the business world. Review plans guide leaders and managers through the critical process of providing feedback to employees on their job performance and accomplishments. Feedback, setting goals, and providing resources are all key to creating an effective leader. But what does an effective review plan even look like? What should get covered?
It's a good practice to establish a formal, documented plan for conducting performance reviews for both supervisory and non-supervisory employees. It can be beneficial for managers and employees to have a standard process with set timelines and expectations. The following are key characteristics of a solid review plan:
- Document it: A review should be well-documented whether you use current software or create your own filing system. This makes it easy to look back on in the future and assess growth and development.
- Set a timeline: Reviews don't have to be an annual thing. When bringing on new hires, 30-day, 60-day, and 90-day reviews can be crucial to the success and onboarding of an employee. This allows them to present challenges or discuss expectations. After that, feel free to switch to a six-month or annual review cadence.
- Create room for discussion: Apart from anything, a review should be a time to have a safe and honest discussion. This creates a space where the employee can ask questions and bring up circumstances that they can learn from.
- Allow feedback: Some companies opt for peer reviewing for reviews, and others choose to have higher-ups give the feedback. Whatever you choose, make sure it fits your company culture and the goals you hope to reach through a solid review plan. If you opt for peer review, make sure it’s anonymous.
- Set goals: Reviews are an ideal time to set goals to reach by the next review. Perhaps this employee wants to become a manager or learn a new skill. Whatever these goals might be, discuss them honestly and plan to have follow-up discussions to check in on progress.
- Express needs: Whether you have requests for this employee or they have requests for you, a review allows space to make those needs known. Perhaps they need a better workspace or want to change their schedule. Creating room to speak about these things only leads to a better work culture.
- Discuss accomplishments and challenges: Lastly, talk about wins and fails. It’s ok not to have it all figured out, and as humans, we all make mistakes. What’s important is that we learn from them while also remembering to celebrate our accomplishments.
Everyone wants to be a better leader, and review plans certainly help. It’s not an easy role, and it takes time, practice, and discipline. That's why most leaders will have mentors, coaches, and other resources they can lean on during this time of growth. One of the best ways to do this is by going a step beyond and creating a leadership development program.
What Is A Leadership Development Program?
There is no such thing as a one-size-fits-all leadership development program. Effective and productive leadership development programs are designed according to the individual needs of each leader in your organization. However, it can be helpful to structure your leader training sessions with a well-thought-out structured approach.
Leadership development programs cover everything from goals, performance reviews, professional growth and development, ratings, learning opportunities, check-ins, and more. It gives leadership a tangible way to assess how they’re doing and what they could improve while also consistently learning.
Why Should You Create A Leadership Development Program?
With the right tools, your leadership development program can help you change or refine your approach to leadership roles. It can also provide a framework for building a personal brand within the company. Creating a leadership development program will give your employees the tools they need to succeed and an opportunity to feel seen and heard.
These programs also give peers the opportunity to review each other anonymously, which creates a judgment-free and honest work environment. This feedback can be instrumental in setting communication goals and strengthening work relationships. Some of the benefits of leadership development programs are that it:
- Sharpens everyone's communication skills so that individuals have a better understanding of how to work as a team, boosting teamwork, and collaboration
- Helps guide a business toward success and growth opportunities
- Helps manage change and demonstrates what adaptability looks like
- Demonstrates confidence and authority in project leadership
- Promotes an educating, empowering, and encouraging company culture
- Helps with employee retention
How To Create A Leadership Development Program
There is not a one-size-fits-all to a good leadership development plan. However, there are several methods you can use when building one out. It’s important to ask yourself what you want to gain from it. Here are some questions to consider:
- What does our leadership currently look like?
- What are common problems we'd like to solve?
- Do our leaders feel set up for success?
- Do we have a culture of feedback and transparency?
Once you’ve asked yourself these questions, now it’s time to develop a program. It’s critical to remember that, as a leader, your role is to develop future leaders in the organization. All new hires will eventually join your team as managers, so this program can be used for any employee, regardless of their title. Leadership development methods can include:
- Leadership workshops: This is the most common way of going through leadership training, focusing on one topic at a time. Workshops usually involve hands-on activities or example scenarios. This gives a real-life approach to situations.
- Leadership seminars: Seminars are for larger groups of people and offer an interactive way for teams to learn together and network with other professionals.
- Online courses: If you’re looking to learn at your own pace, an online leadership course can be a great option. Not only does this work great for being a better manager, but they also are handy in learning or brushing up on new skills.
- Leadership conferences: Conferences help those already in leadership positions strengthen existing skills. It’s also a great opportunity to learn from other great leaders and share that knowledge.
- Review plans: While we already covered this, review plans are a huge part of a healthy leadership development plan. Without reviews, it’s difficult to determine what needs improvement and what you’re doing well.
- Consistent coaching and one-on-ones: You already have great leaders within your organization. Having your current employees shadow them and meet with them creates an environment of coaching. Consistent one-on-ones with managers allow leaders to create ongoing goals and opportunities to ask for advice.
Putting Leadership Development Into Practice
You might be thinking to yourself, “This all sounds like a lot of work.” And it is. However, if you want to retain good quality leaders, investing in them is key. Leadership development isn’t just extra tasks and things to do – it’s a culture. To truly put this into practice, you must create an environment that is development friendly. You can do this by:
- Setting expectations: Let current employees know that this is happening. Meet with them to introduce them to this new program and how review plans work. This is a time when they can ask questions.
- Enforce this plan: A plan only works if people are filling out the reviews and attending the one-on-ones. While things happen and meetings may need moved, be sure to follow up and express the importance of the leadership development plan.
- Incorporate it into your onboarding: When onboarding new leadership, enforce and discuss this program from the start. Inform them of your review cycles and create training resources that are focused on development.
Your company will benefit greatly from putting leadership and feedback at the forefront. Doing so weeds out leaders who may not be a good fit for your company and rewards leaders who do a great job. Not only that, but this plan can build up those qualities in all of your employees, which means better work and happier employees.
Create Leadership Programs And Review Plans With Ease
Review plans allow you the opportunity to grow leaders and talent in your organization but creating and managing them can be daunting. Recruiting, hiring, and training staff is time-consuming and costly. See how GMS can assist with training and recruiting for your company by reaching out today! Contact us to learn more.