As a business leader, it’s your job to manage and grow your business as effectively as possible. A big part of accomplishing that comes down to improving employee performance. Businesses that successfully nurture and inspire their best employees are, understandably, more likely to reach long-term goals and achieve sustained growth. Figuring out how to vet, review, and inspire your team is essential. To that end, today we’ll explain how business leaders can hold positive performance reviews with their team members. Check it out here:

Set Clear Expectations

Even the best employees need guidance from management if they’re to improve on a consistent basis. As such, business leaders must make it a point to set clear expectations for their team members regarding their workload, assignments, and priorities. Regardless of whether you want your team to communicate with each other more often, or to focus on developing a new line of tissue culture flasks, you have to let them know well in advance of their review date.

Stick to the Facts

The best business leaders are able to manage their emotions when they make important decisions. While you may personally like or dislike a certain employee, it’s important not to let your subjective feelings affect the way you treat your team. It’s best to stick to the facts when you sit down to have performance reviews with your staff. Use evidence such as sales figures, marketing data, ecommerce production etc. to objectively measure the value of your team. Anecdotal evidence of employee behavior may be useful in some instances, but it tends to skew the bigger picture in one way or another.

Solicit Feedback

The employer-employee relationship is a two-way street. That’s why many business leaders encourage their team members to provide feedback during review meetings. Perhaps there are mitigating factors that are inhibiting an employee’s performance that business leaders should know about. Or, alternatively, maybe certain changes around the office have resulted in an uptick in their mood and productivity. The point is, you won’t know these things unless you ask and allow your team members to speak for themselves.

Inspire

Ideally, every employee should leave their performance review meeting feeling inspired and fired up to do better in the future. Rather than focusing on how an employee failed or what they could have done differently, progressive business leaders use performance reviews as an opportunity to inspire their team members. A word of support, a bit of useful advice, or even an exciting challenge can all resonate with employees in need of a lift. Now is your chance to do something positive for your employees –– don’t miss it!