People, Not Machines: The 5 Drivers of Employee Performance w/ Jason Lauritsen, Author of “Unlocking High Performance” (#33)

Jason Lauritsen on Employee Performance:

What you’ve experienced is a production style of management that was born out of the Industrial Revolution in an era where we were taking people off the farm, putting them in factories to basically do jobs that were better suited for machines, but we didn’t have the technology to build those machines yet. So we had to get people to behave like those machines.

We’re still stuck where we think of people and treat people like machines to be optimized, to be tweaked.

The problem is, that doesn’t work for human performance.

Managers aren't managing machines. They are managing these growing, developing, imperfect human beings who have needs and are facing obstacles and really want to be successful. And if they’re not, then that means there’s something going on that you need to solve for them or help them with. And when you get that shift made, things start to change.

Highlights:

[2:03] Can annual reviews actually be harmful to an employer?

[6:27] Unintended consequences of tying annual reviews to compensation

[7:16] Annual review horror stories

[9:04] Changing your employee performance appraisal process

[16:15] Putting managers in a better position to help employees learn and grow

[21:52] Beginning of the year conversations

[25:38] Deficit conversations

[34:17] Feedback strategies to help employees succeed

[41:35] “The perfect end-of-year conversation” and merit/bonus conversations

[49:09] How much of an effect does hybrid work have on company culture?

Guest Bio

Jason Lauritsen is an author, a keynote speaker, and a leader trainer, and has been named a Top 100 HR Tech Influencer by HR Executive Magazine, a Top 100 HR Influencer by Engagedly, and a Top 100 Global Employee Engagement and Experience Influencer by Inspiring Workplaces. He is also the author of two books, “Unlocking High Performance: How to Use Performance Management to Engage and Empower Employees to Reach Their Full Potential” and “Social Gravity: Harnessing the Natural Laws of Relationships.” Both are available on Amazon.

Links

https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonlauritsen/

https://jasonlauritsen.com/

https://www.hrmorning.com/lp/webinars/reducing-the-stress-of-performance-reviews/

https://www.hrmorning.com/articles/toxic-culture/

https://www.hrmorning.com/articles/case-for-conversation/

Berta Aldrich’s best-selling book, Winning the Talent Shift, is available on Amazon ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://a.co/d/iS7MuPJ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

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