Are you being too nice?

 Managing performance is tricky…and giving feedback can be daunting. It is an especially sticky point for new joiners.

It isn’t surprising that most employers want to encourage and support new joiners and give them time to settle in. You don’t want them to feel downhearted straight off the bat.  But are you being too nice?

We shared a post recently about new starters not getting feedback early enough which you can read here.

They say that you catch more bees with honey than vinegar. That is certainly true, but I’m sure that overfeeding bees can’t be good either…

I had no idea what happens when you overfeed bees so I Googled it! It was pretty obvious actually. If you over feed bees the colony outgrows the hive and they end up abandoning it in search of a bigger one.

In this instance this is a pretty poor choice of analogy…it would be better if the excess honey made the bees get stuck in the hive, making them unable to move on.

You’re probably wondering what I am going on about…

If you give new recruits too much time to settle in before they get any feedback and focus solely on encouragement, they can end up stuck with damaged relationships and undermined credibility if they are actually making significant mistakes from the get go.

The longer this period is allowed to continue, the more likely reputational damage is done and that will stick with them.

The obvious answer to this is to give new recruits feedback as soon as possible, but there is a fine line between giving good, constructive feedback and making someone feel singled out and like they aren’t doing a good job.

So how early is too early?

The 60-day mark is roughly the right time to start giving feedback. The new recruit has had enough time to become familiar with the business and their colleagues but it is still early enough to catch any early indications of issues they might have.

The process doesn’t need to be excessive; it can be bespoke for your business requirements

We shared a post recently about how to give good feedback with some hints and tips, which you can recap on here.

We always recommend 360 feedback, which we talked about here.

Find out how we used 360 feedback for our clients

To find out how Reality HR can support your business growth and help you with managing performance, give us a call on 01256 328 428 or fill out the form below to organise a callback.

 

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from Reality HR Limited http://www.realityhr.co.uk/blog/4025/