How to Make Performance Measurement FUN!

Measuring employee performance can be a tricky business. While there are many schools of thought regarding how to conduct the performance review, most everyone agrees that a review must be conducted regularly, and that some type of measurement must be built into the system. If you don't have the measurement aspect in place, how do you know what to assess?

Take Jane, for example. She has worked for your company for five years and is considered a loyal, good employee who always gets her work done on time. However, upon closer examination, you see that her performance reviews or employee appraisals are based only on surface details. Although she asks for constant feedback, the only response she gets is, "You're doing fine," or "Thanks very much."

Employees who expect and want to succeed in a crowded business marketplace want much more than simple feedback. Naturally, they want to know how they're doing in their jobs in a general sense - "qualitative" measurement - but also want to validate how they contribute to the company's bottom line - "quantitative" measurement.

The qualitative part is easy. Does the employee show up on time? Does he or she do what's expected of them? Do they have great ideas? Do they go above and beyond the scope of their job?

Quantitative measurement or measurement by numbers is much more difficult, but is most commonly accomplished by measuring performance to the company's goals or initiatives. For example, in a retail setting, factors like total sales, number of satisfied customers, number of retained customers and other areas are measured. Most often, each industry has certain performance measures, which impact a company's bottom line. Each offers many opportunities to measure - and increase - performance. Each company has different factors, tasks or activities with regard to what is measured, so there is no book to follow in order to create these measures. Some industries that respond well to performance measures, include health care, auto dealerships, retail and manufacturing, just to name a few.