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1.
INTRODUCTION
Most of
us have, one time or another, experienced the frustration
and uncertainty of not knowing what is expected of you in
the work situation, or not knowing how you are doing - having
phantom managers who you rarely ever saw, or who were scared
or incompetent to give you the necessary direction and feedback.
There
is a saying that "if you don't know where you are going,
then any road will take you there".
Any organization
that finds itself on this road is doomed - local and international
competition will soon take care of that.
But although
it is the job of top management to show the right way, they
can not do it all by themselves - it will have to be a team
effort behind which all employees need to throw their combined
weight.
This means
clarity of vision and purpose from top to bottom so that everybody
gets to know the identified road, and what their part in it
should be.
This philosophy
is supported by the concept of cascading ('deploying') goals
and objectives from top to bottom throughout an organization.
CASCADED
GOALS AND OBJECTIVES
The process
should start with Strategic Planning by the top management
team who should come up with a Corporate Strategic Business
Plan for the year, containing, inter alia, the corporate vision,
mission, values, goals and strategies for the short to long
term. In turn, this should be followed by similar strategic
and operational planning sessions at the lower unit levels
(e.g. division, department, section), each lower level using
the higher level Business Plans as input into their own process.
Objectives for individual employees are being derived from
the appropriate Business Plan of the unit of which they are
members. Planning, therefore, should take place "top-down".
So, by
each employee achieving shier own objectives, the corporate
vision and goals will eventually be achieved, "bottom-up".
This process
supports the notion that if you fail to plan, you plan to
fail - but it also demonstrates how top-down goals and objectives
are operationalized into practical and achievable individual
employee objectives, right down to the lowest level in the
organization.
Let's
look in a bit more detail how this process works:
At a Strategic
Planning Session, the strategic priorities and goals for a
unit are decided, but eventually also who should take responsibility
for what, by way of an Operational Action Plan
The strategic
planning session is then followed by one-on-one performance
planning meetings between line managers and jobholders, drawing
from this Action Plan those objectives allocated to the respective
jobholders. To this then are added any further objectives
the position demands.
Before
the next, say, 3, 4 or 6-monthly formal Performance Reviews/Appraisals
take place, the unit/team should meet again to review the
achievement of the previously set Action Plan, and to renew
it for the next period as necessary.
Strategic
Planning precedes Employee Performance Management, but falls
outside the scope of this guide, so let's focus on Performance
Management in detail.
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