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Sue's Daily Blog

Be Sure to Read to #12 – #120

by Sue Hawkes

Be Sure to Read to #12 – #120

One of the great gifts that comes with blogging is when readers comment (please do). It’s even better when you ask questions to continue the dialog. This blog is an answer to Maia who wrote in after blog #75, “Where You Go, They Go” was published on our social media as well as on the EOS Worldwide blog as well. She wrote: ‘Exactly HOW should companies measure and evaluate employees against values, and will you include tangible examples? We include the values in our performance reviews and ask the managers to evaluate employees against those values. We also ask candidates to talk about how they have embodied those values when we interview them. Are there more examples of what we should be doing?’ Thanks Maia, here’s my answer. I hope it moves you and your company forward!

Yess! There are many ways you can expand on the great practices you already have. First,  when you conduct performance reviews quarterly using the People Analyzer (for EOS companies, which Maia’s company is), do you keep a running record of when that person exceeded expectations for that value as well as examples of when they are underperforming behaviorally. Many great managers do this weekly as the events happen and throw them in a file. In addition, they talk with that employee within 24 hours of the event – meaning if they exceeded or missed expectations, the manager is sharing specific feedback and anchoring it to one of your core values.  Then, they document it quickly and toss it in the employee’s file. Prior to the review, they have a quarter’s worth of documentation of exactly how the employee has been contributing to your culture. When leaders follow this way of reviewing, no one is in the dark about performance, you are all consistently using core values as the “handful of rules” which we measure behavior by.*

Here’s a checklist and some examples for you as a leader/leadership team – be sure to read to #12!:

    1. Are you delivering an inspiring State of the Company every 90 days? https://www.instagram.com/p/Bq-MwBWBr5n/
    2. Are you including examples, stories, analogies about each core value?
    3. Do you bring your passion to this opportunity and get creative in your delivery?
    4. If I walked up to any employee in your company and asked them to share core values, would they know them, and share them in a way I could experience them as they shared?
    5. Is your leadership team actively calling out behavior and linking exceptional perfprmance and underperformance to your CV daily, weekly and monthly.
    6. Are you conducting both quarterly conversations (informal review) and people analyzers (formal review)? 
    7. Are you using the 3 strike rule if people are consistently underperforming?
    8. Do you communicate within 24 hours when people exceed or underperform based on core values as well as objective results?
    9. Are you making one people move per quarter as a leadership team?
    10. Are you using Core Values to reward and recognize? Here’s an example from FastSpot: https://www.fastspot.com/publications/fostering-a-supportive-culture/
    11. Do you do core value shout outs at your L10 meetings or staff meetings?
    12. For hundreds of ideas and resources, text 44222 & enter CVWINS to receive a list of articles & resources to improve your hiring, firing, reviewing, rewarding & recognizing to unleash the power of your people!

Here’s the trick – most leaders are challenged by offering effective, specific behavioral accountability aligned to Core Values. It’s trickier than performance-based accountability. Most people are comfortable correcting black and white measurables. They happened or they didn’t. Correcting behavior? That’s another thing. It’s uncomfortable and enters into the realm of people not liking you or what you say. Truly great leaders and companies are not afraid of this. They measure success by the health of their culture as defined by clients identifying the culture in action beyond the company. It’s worthy, are you up for it?

*Pro-tip – you’ll know this is working overall when peer to peer accountability happens in the same manner – in a thriving culture, your employees will call out anyone (including the owners and leaders) who is misaligned as well. Any time this happens, it should be met with a sincere “thank you” and a healthy conversation to realign.