Staff not tolerant of bosses who tolerate poor performance

How effectively is poor performance managed in your workplace? Well, if yours is like most organisations the answer is probably "not very well". And if you happen to be in the public sector, that answer will more likely be even more damning _ at least according to your own staff it will be.

This is one of the more intriguing findings to emerge from workplace research carried out last year by survey and analysis specialist JRA on data collected from over 200 organisations.

"Dealing with poor performance is something all organisations seem to struggle with," says JRA managing director John Robertson. "It was the lowest-rated of all questions in our 2008 survey, and typically one of the lowest-rated questions even in our best performing workplaces. The thing to reflect on here is that it's employees themselves who are giving their employers the thumbs down _ employees who are saying, `You're too tolerant of poor performance and you should do something about it'."

So with the pressure to perform more intense than ever, and with employees themselves apparently fully behind more effective performance management, what's the key to better results in this area? Robertson says the answer lies not in discipline administered by squads of "policemen managers", but rather in developing an organisation culture that is intolerant of poor performance.

"When we spoke with organisations who had scored poorly in this area, more often than not we heard a great deal about the onerous nature of current employment law _ the `you just can't sack people today' thing.

"On the other hand, the discussions we had with our best workplaces included repeated reference to the emphasis placed on performance standards and expectations during the recruitment and induction of new staff, clarity of responsibilities and accountability for results, recognition and rewards for performance and the celebration of success, and above all supportive leaders who provide ongoing support, coaching and mentoring of staff," he says. "In these operations it's the people and teams themselves and the workplace culture they create that maintains performance standards _ it's an environment where people who `drag the chain' get the message pretty quickly and either step up or move on to more tolerant _ and poorer performing _ organisations."

The JRA Best Workplaces Survey in association with the Herald, and sponsored by HainesAttract and the Auckland Chamber of Commerce, runs until August 31.

Already more than 110 organisation are taking part.