A healthy and well-run organization can be attributed to a team of inspired and motivated employees. That is why having unmotivated and lackluster team members can be detrimental to a business’s overall goal and should be addressed as soon as possible. Underperforming employees are common in any business, but managers and leaders can put employees back “on track.” As a team leader, it is vital to understand the reasons behind your employees’ underperformance clearly; only then can you work on it to improve their productivity.
Below are four questions that will help you address underperforming employees in your organization.
Why is it important to inspire and motivate underperforming employees?
Reliable, happy employees are crucial to the health of your business. If someone is not performing or delivering their expected tasks and duties, a company can start to suffer. If one’s workload is lacking, it can put increased strain on another team member, creating a domino effect. Not only can a business be affected in quality, but other employees can also be susceptible to the negativity from this other employee.
How do you know if you have underperforming employees?
Many factors will determine if an employee is underperforming and unsatisfied with their job. Some of these factors may include: unsatisfactory work in the eyes of the manager, low participation in workplace activities, and passive-aggressively withdrawing from work altogether.
What are some ways to inspire and motivate an underperforming employee?
Not every company has an HR department that can spearhead this, but the concept remains the same. Talk with your employees. Dig into their work performance and find the pain points that could deter them from producing the work they were hired to do. Develop a “Performance Improvement Plan” (also known as PIP) with the employee to set up standards of performance and areas for improvement.
With the employee and other members of their management, create a list of areas where they are underperforming and a timeline to remedy those areas. What is essential here is not to make the employee feel shame but instead empower them to make changes. They may or may not be aware of why their performance has suffered. Perhaps their desk is in a distracting spot, or steps have not been made to help them refine a skill.
Whatever the reason may be, use these talking points to encourage these employees to grow within their roles and to establish work parameters that are measurable for them.
How do you know if you’re effectively leading employees to be motivated and inspired?
Believing that uninspired and underperforming employees can change is a great tool to motivate your team. Having the mindset to improve their workload or face any challenges head-on will be optimal for success. Keeping them up to date with progress or unmet expectations is one way to know if you are doing well as a manager to guide an employee. Beginning to see change or improvement is also a great measure to see how effective your efforts have been.
Inspiring and motivating employees is vital to the success of any business. After asking yourself the questions above to help determine and encourage someone who has been underperforming in their work, you can see real transformative change in how your team operates. Over time, you can have a healthy and thriving work culture by implementing a sound system to check up on employees’ work performance.