People can’t be at their best all the time. We all have our ups and downs. On some days, we’re super-efficient and complete the planned tasks fast. And on others, our productivity tumbles, we feel distracted, and even ten cups of coffee can’t fix that.
But what to do if an employee shows unsatisfactory results consistently? What if they frequently fail to finish their work on schedule, slow down the collective progress, and just can’t get it right? Obviously, such a situation is costly for a business, and it must be corrected in order to achieve high-quality outcomes and be successful overall.
The #1 way to improve the performance of your team is through careful planning and execution, and our performance improvement plan template is here to help you with that.
Read our guide for the best tips on how to set employee goals, track improvement progress and measure success and then customize the template to your team’s needs. Download it now and enjoy better employee performance! 👇
What Is a Performance Improvement Plan?
A performance improvement plan is an official document for an underperforming employee. It lists the weak spots in that employee’s work and states which actions they need to undertake in order to gain ground and eventually become more efficient.
A performance improvement plan is developed by a staff member who distinctly understands how the employee behaves at the workplace and has first-hand experience of their performance shortfalls (i.e., a supervisor, a project manager, or a team leader). Then, the document gets approved by an HR representative, and the strive towards improvement begins.
Performance Improvement Plan Template: 5 Key Elements
Every effective performance improvement plan contains five core elements:
- Purpose statement
- Performance goals and ways to achieve them
- Deadlines
- List of key participants and their roles
- Statement of implications
Our performance improvement plan template gives you space to record all this information in a convenient way. And here’s how to work with each element step by step:
1. Purpose and problem statement
An introduction is meant to spell out why a performance improvement plan is created in the first place and what you expect to gain after it’s implemented. So, when reading the initial part of the document, the employee should develop a clear idea of what they’re doing wrong, why they should even care about it, and what you want from them.
2. Objectives and actions
To help the employee improve and actually get closer to that ideal workplace behavior, managers need to supply them with a step-by-step action plan. It should include SMART performance objectives – Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-bound. Plus, it has to prompt which practices, tools, and methods the employee may use to meet the set objectives.
Imagine that one of your content writers shows lower productivity than the rest of the team, and you want them to produce more quality blog posts than usual. In that case, an appropriate SMART objective for that employee would be as follows: “Write ten 1000-word articles per month.” Sounds simple, isn’t it? But the trick is to actually find a way to increase the output. Some of the actions and solutions that could be useful in this regard are:
- Time tracking
- Productivity audit
- Distraction blocking
- Automated editing and grammar-checking software
- Copywriting courses, etc.
3. Deadlines
Deadlines are crucial when it comes to implementing a performance improvement plan. Time-bound performance objectives are merely one thing here. The document should also inform how long the improvement period will remain in force (it usually lasts for 30, 60, or 90 days depending on the nature of the problem). Besides, you need to agree on the dates for interim performance check-ins and choose when the final review will be conducted.
Deadlines are necessary for keeping the improvement process more organized. They can also help the employee to keep focus and give them that extra motivation boost to work harder.
4. Participants and their responsibilities
The underperforming employee is always the main actor in the performance improvement process. But they’re never alone. There are also those who supervise the implementation of a performance improvement plan, check ongoing work results, provide guidance and support.
So, to be clear about who’s involved and how, it’s useful to list all the participants and their roles in the document – this helps to reduce confusion and make communication more effective.
5. Implications
What will happen if the employee can’t achieve the set improvement objectives by the deadline? And what if they exceed your expectations? Will you dismiss or demote them in case of failure, or will you reward them for success in any way? It’s important to keep different outcome scenarios in mind and specify what follows at the end of the plan implementation process.
Performance Improvement Plan: An Excellent Idea or Waste of Time?
Wondering if a performance improvement plan is a worthwhile endeavor? After all, people don’t like when others point at their shortfalls. Plus, using such a plan requires time, and there’s no guarantee that the employee will commit to it 100%.
And still, the answer is YES! Performance improvement plans are totally worth the effort, and here’s why:
- Decreased business costs | Low productivity is linked to significant business expenses. But new employee recruitment is not different. By providing current team members with a chance to better their performance, you can enhance outputs without spending money on the hiring process. In most cases, the improvement of what you already have is indeed the most affordable and cost-efficient way to boost productivity.
- Stronger employee accountability and discipline | Punishing employees for tiny mistakes and controlling everything they do is never a good option. However, ignoring their faults is detrimental to your company too. So, performance improvement plans can help you find that necessary balance between strict supervision and employee independence. They show that you care about business productivity and quality of work. Thereby, they promote a sense of responsibility for individual performance outcomes in your team.
- Higher job satisfaction | Many people perceive performance improvement plans negatively and see them as invitations to dismissal. But in fact, such plans can turn into a great demonstration of care for employees. Using them means that you value your workers and want to maintain positive and productive relationships with them. The trick is to explain to your team what performance improvement plans are actually for and align their implementation with effective motivation strategies, including growth opportunities and rewards in case of success.
- Formalized and effective improvement process | When creating a performance improvement plan, you don’t just blame an employee for poor work outcomes and leave them to figure it out on their own. Instead, you develop a realistic and thought-through action program and provide ongoing mentorship and support. All this makes it relatively easy to measure progress and attain success by the deadline.
When Do You Need a Performance Improvement Plan?
A performance improvement plan should never be used as a means to start the termination process. Apply it only in case an actual possibility for improvement exists, if you really believe that an employee can change their behaviors and skills for the better, and you’re ready to assist them with that. Otherwise, you will simply throw the dust into your staff members’ eyes and turn a highly beneficial practice into an extremely harmful scheme.
So, prior to drafting a performance improvement plan, you need to understand if an employee’s performance deficiency can be corrected through a formal and goal-oriented improvement process. Here are a few examples of such problems:
Example #1
Performance problem: Low-quality customer service and frequent customer complaints.
SMART improvement objective: Increase the rate of customer satisfaction by two points within the next 60 days.
Actions and tools:
- Education on active listening,
- Respond to clients’ emails in less than five minutes, etc.
Progress assessment methods: Customer rating and feedback.
Example #2
Performance problem: Too many performance mistakes that require a lot of time to fix.
SMART improvement objective: Reduce the number of coding errors per month to five in 60 days.
Actions and tools:
- Work on coding skills,
- Use an online code checker, etc.
Progress assessment methods: Work quality evaluation form.
Example #3
Performance problem: Fewer tasks are completed than expected.
SMART improvement objective: Write ten 1000-word articles per month.
Actions and tools:
- Carry out productivity audit,
- Apply automated text editing software, etc.
Progress assessment methods: Number of articles written / tasks completed.
Example #4
Performance problem: Constant work delays that disrupt project workflows.
SMART improvement objective: Meet all task deadlines within one month.
Actions and tools:
- Improve task estimation,
- Track time to detect inefficient behaviors,
- Prioritize important tasks, etc.
Progress assessment methods: Number of deadlines met.
Example #5
Performance problem: Frequent tardiness and no-shows at the workplace.
SMART improvement objective: Show up at the office before 10:00 within the next 90 days.
Actions and tools:
- Identify reasons for frequent tardiness,
- Work on time management skills, etc.
Progress assessment methods: Clock-in and -out records.
How to Make the Best Out of Our Performance Improvement Plan Template?
Step 1: Identify a performance problem
To avoid subjective judgments and biased accusations, be sure to use hard evidence. Previous performance appraisals, progress logs, and other relevant records will let you see if an employee indeed has been struggling to meet work requirements for an extended period.
Also, don’t forget to check if they received any guidance or were instructed to correct their mistakes in the past. If not, it might be appropriate to try to fix the problem by simply engaging your employee in discussion first, without referring to a performance improvement plan.
Step 2: Design a performance improvement plan
If you’re convinced that a performance improvement plan is necessary, proceed to compile an official document. Download our free template to make certain all the required information is included. Make a short list of mistakes that the employee continues to commit. State your improvement objectives and indicate what kind of performance is considered acceptable in your company. Clear examples will let the employee know which results and behaviors to strive for.
Step 3: Engage your employee in the process
Employees may be reluctant to change without valid reasons. At the same time, the fear of dismissal or demotion can make one super-stressed and discouraged, which is likely to worsen their performance even more.
A good way to address these challenges is by having a trustful conversation with the underperforming team member and explaining to them why work improvements are crucial in their case. A focus on personal development and achievements is key here – the employee must be interested in advancing at the workplace and not just be scared of losing their job.
Step 4: Provide ongoing support
Performance improvement plans don’t work that well if you’re not willing to commit to helping the employee succeed. For superior results, you need to provide your guidance wholeheartedly throughout the plan implementation process and give specific recommendations of what can be done to make headway. If you leave the employee alone in this enterprise, the risk of failure increases.
Step 5: Monitor progress
To understand if the employee’s performance is improving and correct mistakes promptly, it’s essential to track their progress continually and consistently. So, choose the monitoring tools that allow for managing the identified performance problems best.
For instance, if you want the employee to better comply with task estimates and avoid project delays, consider applying such an hour tracker as actiTIME. It’s incredibly helpful in showing users how they dispose of their working time and educates them to do that more efficiently.
Conclusion
A performance improvement plan is your key to enhancing business outcomes and establishing long-term positive relationships with employees. If created and implemented the right way, it can be equally beneficial for both your team members and the company as a whole. It allows you to reduce business costs while developing growth-oriented workplace culture and providing more opportunities for workers’ professional development.
Focus on the positive side of performance improvement and support your employees during the plan implementation process. This way, you will increase your chances for success and gain maximum advantages from this valuable practice.
