2. MEET MIND GYM
61% of FTSE 100 and 53% of S&P 100 companies
use Mind Gym for major challenges, such as:
• Building a high performance culture (Microsoft,
Thomson Reuters)
• Delivering major productivity gains with more
effective managers (Unilever, Met Life)
• Turning around employee engagement
(Zurich, Telefonica)
• Transforming customer service
(Santander, Canon)
• Managing the human aspect of major
re-organisations so they deliver in full
(GSK, UK Government)
In 2015, over 500,000 leaders, managers and
individual contributors will take part in a live Mind
Gym experience delivered by one of 250 qualified
coaches in 40 countries, supported from offices in
London, New York, Dubai and Singapore.
5 MINUTES WITH A GENIUS
BEATS A MONTH WITH A FOOL
We have an extensive portfolio of bite-size,
90-minute workouts on subjects from ‘Creativity
for logical thinkers’ and ‘Conflict detox’ to ‘Wood
for trees’ and ‘Me, me, me’. These have been
independently assessed and proven to deliver the
same impact as a traditional day-long event.
SCIENCE IS SEXY –
IN RESEARCH WE TRUST
Everything in Mind Gym is evidence-based,
drawing on the latest and the best psychology,
behavioural economics and neuroscience.
WE CHOOSE HOW WE THINK FAR
MORE THAN WE REALISE
Instead of taking people from A to B, Mind Gym
takes them from A to options. That’s sustainable.
PEOPLE CHANGE ONLY WHEN
THEY BELIEVE IT’S IN THEIR OWN
BEST INTEREST
From Mind Gym’s brand to bespoke internal
marketing campaigns, we target your employees’
self-interest. This way people change because
they want to, not because their boss tells them.
ONE SIZE FITS NO-ONE
People seize on the tools that they believe
will help them most, rather than ones centrally
ordained.
LITTLE AND OFTEN – THINK GYM
RATHER THAN HEALTH FARM
Application ‘back at work’ exceeds 85% when
people discover a little at a time, giving them
the chance to practice in between.
Mind Gym transforms performance by changing the way people think.
MIND GYM BELIEFS
3. CONTENTS
1. Performance misery 04
2. At the top of my game 06
3. The six conditions 08
a. Purpose – my work matters 13
b. Challenge – it’s demanding 16
c. Attention – you know how I’m doing 18
d. Growth – I am getting better 21
e. Recognition – it’s worth the effort 24
f. Choice – I can decide 27
4. Tricky characters 30
5. Making it happen 32
Case studies 38
References 40
4. 4
The hours spent completing appraisal, self-appraisal
and 360 feedback forms; sitting in talks about how
others are and should be rated; taking part in what is
often an excruciating annual review; and then
responding to the endless chasing emails about
entering goals into a labyrinthine system, are enough
to crush anyone’s soul.
In addition to distracting leaders from more
worthwhile activities, the potential for doing harm is
significant. Formal reviews that focus on weaknesses
reduce performance by up to 27%1
.
Managing a colleague’s performance through an
annual conversation is like managing your marriage
through your anniversary. No wonder the yearly
appraisal has become to recruiters what Christmas
is to divorce lawyers.
And yet 86% of organisations have either revised
their performance management system in the last
18 months, or plan to do so soon.2
If their objective is to increase performance, they’re
looking in the wrong place. 50,000 employees in 22
global companies working in 10 major industry
sectors were asked to rate their manager and their
company’s performance management system. Their
answer was unequivocal. 70% of those who gave their
manager top marks also viewed the performance
management system as ‘very good’. Conversely, the
employees who rated their manager as ‘below
1. PERFORMANCE
MISERY
Performance management. No two words from the corporate lexicon
are more certain to dampen the mood of anyone you’d actually want
to employ.
Annual performance appraisals
are to recruiters what Christmas
is to divorce lawyers
5. 5
average’ overwhelmingly rated the very same system
as ‘poor’.3
In other words, the system you choose will
make little difference to performance if your managers
don’t know how to get the best from their people.
Debates about whether rankings should be ‘forced’,
‘guided’ or ignored, whether goals should be set
annually, quarterly or monthly, or whether pay should
be linked to performance scores, miss the point.
A new performance management system is no more
‘the answer’ to raising performance than a new
Customer Relationship Management System is to
delighting customers.
That’s not to say that we should scrap the system
entirely. Whichever methodology an organisation
chooses will be essential to certain aspects of its grip
on performance – tracking it, reviewing trends,
ensuring fairness and consistency, and satisfying legal
and HR requirements.
And some modifications to the system can act as a
powerful symbol of a greater change. When the
bosses at Microsoft removed forced ranking, it made
a strong statement of intent, as the HR chief Lisa
Brummel in her company-wide memo: ‘we are
moving from a culture of negative competition,
mistrust and poor management, to one of teamwork,
collaboration, and employee development.’ But if
Microsoft’s leaders had imagined that this alone would
make much difference they would have been bitterly
disappointed (discover how Microsoft did make a
substantial difference on page 39).
Bosses tend to have risen into their leadership roles by
successfully optimising resources. When it comes to
maximising return from their company’s hefty payroll,
their inclination is to marshal human resources much
like any other kind.
There are plenty of proven ways to get people to
perform at the top of their game, they just aren’t based
in process design, inventory management, forensic
metrics or sparkling new IT.
They are built on the science of
human behaviour: psychology.
Fig.1
Rating of performance management system Organisations
changing performance
management systems
in past/next 18
months
0
20
40
60
70%
85%
80
100
Employees
rating system
as ‘very good’
Managers rated as ‘best’
Managers rated as ‘below average’
Employees
rating system
as ‘poor’
Percentageofemployees(%)
86%
PERFORMANCE MISERY
Source: Gallup (2013) Source: Deloitte (2014)
7. 7
The model shows that, initially, the more excited we
become about a challenge the better we do at it.
As our arousal increases (to use Yerkes-Dodsons’
term), we move into ‘eustress’, which is a positive
kind of stress known as euphoric stress. This is a
motivational state that not only changes our
perception of the things that might otherwise
cause us to underperform (‘obstacles’ become
‘challenges’) but also our perception of our own
capability (‘I believe I can do this’). When we’re in
a state of eustress we feel motivated, stretched,
and full of energy. As a result, we perform nearer
the top of our game.
An engineer in a workout said to his Mind Gym Coach,
‘I never get stressed. In fact the only thing that stresses
me is when my peers get promoted ahead of me’.
It’s not hard to diagnose what is happening. The
engineer who doesn’t experience any stress is
‘coasting’ and his peers are experiencing ‘eustress’.
As a result, they are performing to a higher level and
getting promoted faster.
The increase in arousal works up to a point. After that,
it has the opposite effect. Anxiety-levels become too
great and we experience distress, which is short for
destructive stress. At this point, our performance starts
to drop.
The key to getting people to perform at the top of
their game is to help (i) ensure that they operate at the
peak of their curve most of the time, and (ii) change
the height and breadth of the curve.
Here’s how…
What gets us to perform at our best?
This was the question two psychologists, Robert Yerkes and John Dodson,
examined over a century ago. Their language might seem old fashioned but
the Yerkes-Dodson model is as relevant today as when they published it.4
Fig.2
Impact of arousal on performance
Low High
Arousal
Coasting
Eustress
Overstretched
Performer
Top performer
Underperformer
Low
High
Performance
AT THE TOP OF MY GAME
Source: Yerkes Dodson (1908)
8. 8
3. THE SIX
CONDITIONS
The key to creating a high performance culture is setting
up and maintaining the right psychological conditions.
These conditions can be temporary and restricted to
specific situations or they can be pervasive and seem
almost permanent. Sometimes they exist without
anyone consciously creating them, say, when you’re
playing a competitive sport you love. At work,
however, these conditions seldom arrive by chance.
In most high performing environments considerable
effort has been made to put and keep them in place.
Mind Gym’s psychologists have identified the six
conditions which have the most, and most certain,
impact on building an environment where we’re all
performing at the top of our game.
In the subsequent chapters, we’ll share what each
condition is, the science that underpins it, and how to
bring them to life where you work. Before that, there
are three questions that deserve an answer.
How do these six conditions fit together?
The six conditions are highly interdependent: altering
one will have a ripple effect on the rest. It’s hard to
increase challenge, for example, without affecting
purpose and growth. It’s also difficult to enhance
recognition without affecting attention.
The science doesn’t suggest that any one condition
has more impact than any other, but rather that the six
conditions are like an ecosystem where the elements
are all inter-related. When one condition is
strengthened it automatically strengthens and
supports the others, and vice versa.
The decision on where to focus for maximum impact
depends on the organisation, the team and the
individual. It could make most sense for the
organisation’s leaders to focus on talking about
purpose, a manager to concentrate on being more
attentive and an individual to increase their agility
when it comes to making choices. Or it could be the
other way around.
PURPOSE
my work matters
ATTENTION
you know how I’m doing
RECOGNITION
it’s worth the effort
10. 10
At an individual level, there are a number of factors that
can affect which conditions are already playing a role
and which need to be cultivated. These include our
upbringing and how this influences how we look at
the world, our social context both at work and outside,
and our personal circumstances, from how things are
going at home, to the nature of changes in the office.
Some of these areas are very personal and it will be
up to each manager/individual contributor to decide
how much it is appropriate to share. One thing is for
sure, some personal aspects should not be brought
to work and the manager is as responsible as the
individual for ensuring that appropriate boundaries
are maintained.
At an organisational or team level, the role a particular
condition has to play will vary depending on national
cultures, organisational cultures and sub-cultures as
well as the environment and industry.
Who’s responsible?
In the traditional world of performance management,
primary responsibility lies with the line manager and
HR is chief enforcer of the process.
In the new world of creating the conditions for
high performance, the employee plays a far more
active part. Manager and employee both have a role
to play and they can succeed only by acting in unison.
This gives employees much greater licence to influence
their chances of success (and they are expected to use
it), while managers are prompted to focus on setting
their team members up to succeed. The buck cannot
be passed. We really are in this together.
For each of these conditions it is possible to be clear
but unexciting, or vice versa. You might know exactly
what the challenge is but not much care, or you
might be very excited about the team’s vision but not
know quite what’s expected of you to deliver it. The
conditions are most potent when they appeal to both
head and heart, ie, they are clear and motivating.
Why will managers change this time?
One of the most popular explanations for ineffective
performance management is the reluctance
of managers to have tough conversations.
Like peas in a pod
Fig.3
While all of the conditions are inextricably linked, there are some that interplay more naturally with one
another. Here are just a few of the keener web-fellows.
Challenge and growth – when we design roles or
allocate tasks to play to an individual’s strengths,
performance is likely to increase. This is because
we have created both a more suitable challenge
and accelerated personal growth.
Attention and recognition – both conditions help
to counter social loafing, which occurs when
people think that if they slacken off there won’t be
significant consequences.
Recognition and growth – those who grow and
develop will win recognition, but as part of
effective recognition, managers should also
provide new opportunities to grow.
Challenge and purpose – when goals are aligned
to a team or company objective the sense of
collective purpose is also likely to increase.
Choice, growth and purpose – it’s easier to
choose a positive path when it feels connected to
the things that matter to us and we can see how
we’ll grow and develop as a result.
Challenge and attention – setting goals and
expectations encourages managers to pay
attention on how well their team are doing. In
turn, managers’ attention spurs individuals to
achieve their goals and so, probably, to grow.
THE SIX CONDITIONS
To borrow a legal phrase:
the manager and individual
contributor are jointly and
severally responsible.
11. 11
Fig.4
My role as an employee Conditions My role as a manager
I make sure my work matters
Purpose
I help my team to see why their
work matters
I relish new challenges that I know
will be demanding
Challenge
I equip people to believe that they
can achieve even the most
challenging goals
I seek feedback, and use it to
get better
Attention
I notice what people are doing,
and hold them to account for
their performance
I master skills that matter to me and
will help me in my future career
Growth
I help people develop and achieve
things in the future that they couldn’t
have done before
I ensure my work is worth the effort
Recognition
I am consistent with who and how
I provide recognition for individuals
and teams
I am proactive in making the best
of every situation
Choice
I empower people to make their own
decisions and offer support in times
of challenge
Jointly and severally responsible
Who can blame them? Telling someone that
what they’re doing isn’t good enough challenges
a number of fairly universal human desires, such
as being liked, not upsetting other people and
feeling in control. It’s no wonder most of us would
rather steer clear.
A lasting legacy of soul-destroying appraisal cycles
is that managers tend to have a negative association
with perfectly sensible activities like giving accurate
feedback and providing balanced career advice (rather
than, say, false hope). Exhorting them to do more
of the right things as part of a new, but not much
improved, performance management process will
have only a limited impact.
By focusing managers’ attention on creating the six
conditions rather than following any process, we
encourage managers to talk about everyday topics,
well, er, every day.
This is both natural and easy, which means that the
conversations are much more likely to happen. As a
result, we greatly increase the chance of creating a
mutually respectful and considerate relationship5
,
and having regular, informal, high-quality dialogue6
,
both of which help people to perform at the top of
their game.
It also greatly reduces the trickiness of a year-end
appraisal. If you’re having regular conversations about
how someone is getting on, then the annual review is
little more than a chance to celebrate and take stock.
You might even look forward to it. Underpinning all of
this is effective, on-the-job managerial coaching
which has been shown to increase reports’ wellbeing,
resilience, attitude to work and ability to achieve
stretching goals.7
Setting up these conditions has plenty of benefits for
the manager. Not only are they likely to get the credit
for a top performing team but work life will become a
whole lot easier. High flyers will seek out a chance to
work for them, colleagues will put in the extra effort
and getting things done will be comparatively
straightforward.
THE SIX CONDITIONS
12. 12
Where do these conditions come from?
Fig.5
Mind Gym’s first report on dynamic performance management was published in 2010.
Since then, over 30 SP/FTSE 100 companies, including Microsoft, Maersk and MetLife (and those are just
the ones beginning with the letter ‘M’) have engaged Mind Gym to help them rethink how they manage
performance.
To support these clients and in preparation for this paper, Mind Gym’s psychologists analysed over 200
peer-reviewed studies on what gets people to perform at their best.
The first draft of this paper was then reviewed by Mind Gym’s Academic Board and senior HR/OD/
Talent from 40 world-renowned companies in the US and UK. Their comments helped shape this
current edition.
We’re restless in our search for new discoveries. If you have views, come across relevant research papers
or have practical experience, we want to hear from you.
Best of all it means that managers, who have only so
much that they can think about at any one time, are
concentrating on the few things that will make the
most difference. This means that they will see results
quickly which will encourage them to keep at it.
Pointing in the right direction
The science is clear: creating these six conditions
creates the best chance that people will perform at
the top of their game, not just today but every day.
Just as critically, by focusing managers and individual
employees’ attention on the conditions, rather than
the system, there is a far greater chance that everyone
will actually adopt the behaviours that lead to high
performance.
The science is robust but what does
it mean in practice?
THE SIX CONDITIONS
13. 13
3a.PURPOSE
MY WORK MATTERS
‘Why am I doing this?’ is a question most of us have asked
ourselves at one time or another. The richer our answer the more
likely we are to perform at the top of our game.
Why bother?
‘Purpose’ covers a wide spectrum.
At one end is putting a man on the
moon, as the fabled cleaner at the
Space Center allegedly told John F
Kennedy. At the other, is simply
feeling that ‘my work is not
irrelevant’. There are plenty of
shades of ‘purpose’ between these
extremes. Feeling one sense of
purpose doesn’t preclude any of
the others, and the stronger our
connection to these purposes,
the more we relish what we’re
doing and the more effort we are
likely to put in.
Here are the three most common
types of ‘purpose’ that directly
affect performance.
1. Task purpose
Your boss asks for the report in her
inbox by end of play on Tuesday.
You work all hours to get it done.
You see her on Thursday and she
hasn’t read it but promises to over
the weekend. You ask her about it
on Monday and it’s clear from her
questions that she’s skimmed it, at
best. You could be forgiven for
thinking that all that work you did
was pointless.
In an experiment, participants were
asked to build Lego figures and
were paid decreasing amounts for
each one they built, starting at $2
for the first, then $1.89 for the
second, $1.78 for the third and
14. 14
so on until they decided to stop.
In Group #1, the completed
figures were displayed as they
were built on an adjacent table;
in Group #2, each figure was
broken down and the pieces
handed back to the participant
to use for their next figure.
The group who watched their
Lego figure being taken apart
completed 30% fewer figures than
their peers, at a 15% higher unit
cost.8
Nothing was said to the
participants in either group like
‘well done’ or ‘nice Lego figures’
but simply the sense that their
work wasn’t pointless led to a
significant productivity gain.
In an analysis of 12,000 workday
diaries completed by employees
in many different companies and
industries there was one factor
that had the biggest difference
between ‘best’ and ‘worst’ days at
work. It was ‘a sense of progress’.
In ‘best’ days, 76% of employees
reported making progress in
contrast to only 25% in self-
reported ‘worst’ days9
.
Simply feeling that our work isn’t
futile can have a significant impact
on our performance. Feeling that
we’re making progress can further
multiply that effect.
2. Collective purpose
Sports analogies can be
misleading. In sport the outcome
is usually decided in a period
between 10 seconds and 90
minutes by between 1 and 15
people and if one side wins,
another loses. A lucky bounce, a
split second or a distracted referee
can make the difference between
triumph and disaster.
Business couldn’t be much more
different. Results come from small
tasks delivered every hour of every
day by hundreds or thousands of
people who barely know of each
other’s existence. There is very
rarely a big event and almost all
the time is spent ‘playing’ rather
than in rehearsal/training. Breaking
the rules of the game is likely to
be the basis for success rather
than a reason to be penalised.
Sport has more in common with
ballet than business.
There is, however, one way in
which sports teams do provide a
helpful analogy for the world of
work: the sense of being in it
together. When sportspeople
talk about the reasons for their
success, they invariably talk
about the strong bonds within
the team and the shared
commitment to winning.
Top performing businesses are
20 times more likely to have every
manager’s goals aligned to the
company strategy.10
In the same
study, 46% of employees’ goals
were explicitly aligned with the
company goals in high performing
companies but this was only 18%
in weaker performing companies.11
Working with people we like,
respect, or ideally both, greatly
increases the chance that we’ll feel
connected12
. For most of us there
are 7-10 people at work who have
a disproportionate effect on how
strong this sense of connection
is.13
Where these relationships are
strong we are more likely to
identify with a shared purpose,
to keep working hard even when
no one notices and to go outside
our role remit to ensure success.14
In otherwise similar scenarios,
groups of close friends or
teammates consistently work
harder and achieve more than
groups composed of strangers or
mere acquaintances.15
The quality of relationships beyond
the core team also matters. When
employees are encouraged to
focus on supporting colleagues in
other parts of the company, rather
than just their own team, there
appears to be an increase in profits
by c.11% and revenue by c.5%.16
In
better networked companies there
is also more innovation17
and they
tend to deliver greater market
share and return on investment.18
PURPOSE
Simply feeling that our work isn’t futile
can have a significant impact on our
performance. Feeling that we’re making
progress further multiplies the effect.
Sport has more
in common with
ballet than business.
15. 15
Fig.6
My relationship with work
2.6
4.2
4.5
2.4
4.6 4.7
1.6*
5.7*
5.5*
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
Job
33%
Career
32%
Calling
35%
Satisfactionlevel
Need for more work-life balance
Life satisfaction
Job satisfaction
3. Social purpose
Imagine you’re asked to allocate
100 points across three different
ways of thinking about your work:
(i) as a job, to earn money to meet
your material needs and wishes
(ii) as a career to be able to take
on a more significant role in the
future, (iii) as a calling that
contributes to a greater good,
anything from helping customers
to lead happier lives to making the
world a better place. What would
your allocation be?
Professor of Organizational
Behaviour, Amy Wrzesniewski,
asked a wide range of workers this
question. She discovered that the
differences across roles were often
insignificant. For example,
physicians, health educators,
hospital janitors and administrators
allocated their points in similar
proportions across ‘job’, ‘career’
and ‘calling’: a third, a third, a third.
The type of work we do seems to
have little, if any, impact on how
we think about it.
This matters because those who
are more inclined to see their work
as a ‘calling’ are significantly more
likely to be satisfied with both their
job and the rest of their life, and
feel the lowest need to adjust their
work-life balance.19
By seeing the ultimate benefits of
our work for society we are likely
to be happier, more fulfilled and
more productive, and whether we
work in the back office of a bank
or the front line of a charity, this
opportunity is equally available.
For those who get stuck and
can’t see any social purpose
to their work, it seems that
performance can still be improved
by working on an overtly social
cause outside the day job.
Employees who volunteer for
‘greater good’ projects also
perform better inside work, even if
the two activities are unrelated.20
*Significant to p0.5 for Calling vs. Job/Career
PURPOSE
Source: Wrzesniewski, McCauley, Rozin, (1997)
16. 16
3b.CHALLENGE
IT’S DEMANDING
A group of shop assistants were
telling a Mind Gym research
analyst about Saturdays.
‘They’re frantic, with customers
who don’t know the store
constantly asking questions and
you’re rushed off your feet without
a moment to catch your breath.
Then when the shop closes you
have to stay back to clear up the
mess and re-arrange everything
for the next day. It’s chaos.’ Our
researcher then asked, ‘so what is
your favourite day of the week?’
‘Saturday, of course’, was the
unanimous answer.
Ask someone to tell you about
their greatest accomplishment and
they will tell you a story that is filled
with hard work, setbacks and
problems. Achieving something
difficult is rarely pleasurable at the
time. It is, however, immensely
rewarding afterwards. A manager
shouldn’t worry when their team
members find something difficult,
but more so when they don’t.
We perform at our best when
we are suitably challenged.
The question is: what is suitable?
1 Clear
When American/Canadian loggers
were given specific, challenging
goals their performance improved
immediately and significantly
compared with those who were
told to simply ‘do their best’.21
In a year-long study with the
American Pulpwood Association,
when goals were explicit, outputs
increased even though there were
no additional rewards. When
performance dropped a third of
the way through the study (block
5, Fig. 7), the loggers were testing
management’s statement that
there would be no punishment
if performance dropped. As soon
as they knew this was true,
performance returned.
When call centre staff recruiting
individuals for market research
focus groups saw their
performance publicly posted,
activity and conversion rates
increased. Peer pressure had an
impact on individuals but even
more so for teams: those working
in a group started to outperform
those working alone.22
Telling people what is expected of
them and how they are doing
against this goal is very likely to
increase productivity. This supports
the old adage that ‘what gets
measured gets done’. However,
there is more to challenge than
simply setting goals and measuring
performance against them.
2 Just within reach
A six-year study of 229
entrepreneur CEOs concluded
that business growth was largely
driven not just by giving
employees stretching goals but
also by helping them believe that
they could achieve them.23
17. 17
In building this belief, the
manager’s responsibility is to help
the individual appreciate the goal is
‘just about possible’. This could be
done, for example, by showing
what resources they could draw
on, or breaking the overall
challenge into more achievable
chunks, or reviewing how the
individual achieved what seemed
like similarly stretching challenges
in the past. The individual’s
responsibility is to take on a
challenge that they don’t yet know
how to achieve but recognise is
just about possible.
Performance management systems
that link reward to accomplishment
of pre-agreed goals create a moral
hazard. In these environments,
it’s in the individual’s financial
self-interest to talk down their
goals even though it’s in their
psychological interest to aim high.
In a study on the impact of goals,
those set a 20% stretch target
achieved 15% (increase in energy
efficiency, in this case), whilst those
set a low target of 2% achieved
6%24
(see Fig. 8). In a rigid
performance management system,
the first group would have been
told that they’d missed their target
(by a quarter) and the second
group congratulated for trouncing
their goal, even though they had
achieved far less. This is clearly the
opposite of what’s needed to
maximise performance.
In order to accept demanding
challenges individuals need to
know that they won’t be penalised
for missing them. The ‘just within
reach’ goal delivers the best
returns for everyone.
3 Up for review
Just because the goal was suitably
stretching when it was agreed,
doesn’t meant that it still is. As
circumstances change it might
have become too easy, or not so
relevant, or downright impossible.
Over 50% of companies where
goals tend to be reviewed each
month are in the top quartile in
terms of financial performance.
In companies where goals were
reviewed once a year only 24%
made it into the same bracket.
The optimum time between
goal review sessions will be
different for different types of
teams. A salesperson won’t
appreciate having their target
chopped and changed. Equally,
a consultant will prefer goals for
each assignment rather than for a
whole year over which they could
end up doing any number of
different things.
The trick for managers is to remain
agile and flexible, ready to spot
and adjust quickly to what will
yield the greatest performance for
their people. For this to work,
individuals also need to be open to
revisiting goals to make them more
relevant and, quite possibly, harder.
The challenge challenge
‘If it’s not hurting it isn’t working’
shouts the sports jock t-shirt.
In the corporate world it is far
less certain. Working life can be
painful in ways that dramatically
reduce performance. Equally, if
your work isn’t suitably stretching
then you aren’t performing at the
top of your game. The answer:
the challenge needs to fit the
individual, not the other way round.
Performance management systems
that link reward to accomplishment of
pre-agreed goals create a moral hazard.
CHALLENGE
Fig.7
Logs loaded as percentage of legal maximum load
50
60
70
80
90
100
Percentagelegalnetweight
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
Blocks of four weeks
Do best
Specific hard goal
Source: Locke Latham, 1984: Latham Kinne, 1974; Latham Yukl, 1975
18. 18
We now know that telling a child
they’re ‘so creative’ or their picture
is ‘beautiful’ is far less helpful than
was assumed. The child is likely to
be confused and not know what
they can do to get noticed in the
same way again. Far more
constructive is to describe their
drawing – a yellow circle, blue
wavy lines, a dark brown oblong
(or more detail for an older child)
– without evaluating it. The tone of
the parent’s voice will be enough
for the child to deduce whether
this is a good thing or not.
The history of corporate feedback
is similarly checkered. The
‘feedback sandwich’, which
recommended a slice of praise at
either end of negative feedback,
was more likely to give
psychological indigestion than
sate an appetite for learning.
When a Mind Gym research
analyst was told by the senior
director of a world-renowned
financial institution that he was
very good at giving praise, the
analyst asked, ‘What do you do
other than say ‘well done’?’ The
director appeared not to compute
the question. After a long pause he
stammered, slightly indignantly,
‘well, what else would you do?’
What do you see?
In a study of more than 19,000
employees, the strongest lever of
increased performance was the
fairness and accuracy of a
manager’s descriptive feedback, ie,
observing direct reports and
reporting on specific examples
of what they saw, without
evaluating it. This appeared to give
performance a whopping
39% boost.26
This simple of act of noticing and
saying what you noticed is
potentially the most powerful
feedback of all. It requires far less
courage than the more traditional
‘tricky messages’ and is far less
open to being considered biased
or inconsistent than old fashioned,
‘well done’, praise. It’s also a skill
that we can all acquire. It just
requires effort from the person
who should be doing the noticing.
YOU KNOW HOW I’M DOING
3c.ATTENTION
Telling a child that they’re ‘so creative’ or
that their picture is ‘beautiful’ is less likely
to help them flourish than describing what
you see in their drawing.25
When we were growing up, telling your child that you loved them
was considered good enough parenting. Research in the last 20
years has revealed that there is rather more to being an effective
mum or dad.
19. 19
Once the observations have been
shared and agreed, either party
can then give their interpretation.
The key is to own this interpretation
rather than assuming it. ‘I noticed
that you asked the candidate the
same question three times, in
slightly different ways. I thought
they hadn’t given a straight
answer the first time. I wondered
if you thought the same.’ The
observation is stated objectively
and the evaluation or interpretation
is owned by the speaker. The other
person is then free to give an
alternative explanation, eg,
‘actually it was because I couldn’t
think of anything else to ask’, or ‘I
thought they had more to say on
the subject and wanted to give
them another chance’.
A climate where descriptive praise
is normal also makes it easier for
the person who wants to be
noticed. Instead of the slightly
awkward, ‘please can you give me
some feedback?’, they can ask the
far less threatening ‘what did you
notice?’.
What do you know?
There’s a world of difference
between asking ‘what are you
working on?’ and ‘how’s your
consumer analysis for the Indian
market entry strategy going?’
In the same study that showed
the impact of descriptive
feedback, performance increased
by 30% when managers were
knowledgeable about their reports’
performance27
. The employee
who thinks their manager always
knows what they are up to is far
more likely to feel appreciated and
so to raise their game.
A failure by the manager to keep
informed leaves the team open
to social loafing. This occurs when
one member of the team starts
to slacken off and seems by his/
her peers to get away with it.
The other team members then
start to ease off too. The first
team member realises he/she is
now working as hard as everyone
else so slackens off even more,
and so the cycle continues. The
way to pre-empt social loafing is
to notice what is going on and
make sure that everyone knows
you’ve noticed.
This is especially so with teams
who work remotely and in
different time zones. Managers
with remote reports might wisely
decide to shadow on a few client
calls or chat over messenger to
keep closer to what is happening.
They will also need to make
extra effort to keep up to speed
with what is going on when they
aren’t around.
ATTENTION
Fig.8 The power of frequent feedback
Baseline
Training
and goal
setting
Training and
goal setting
only
Feeback
once a
week
Feeback
once in
two weeks
Feeback
once in
two weeks
41
Weeks
0 10 16 23 27 32
Safetyperformance
50
40
30
20
10
0
Source: Chhokar and Wallin (1984)
20. 20
In passing
‘Where would I find the time?’
is a well-worn rebuttal from
managers who would rather not
engage in all this ‘people stuff’.
The joy of paying attention is that
it doesn’t require more time, in
fact usually less.
The key to paying attention is to
do it lightly and often. A quick
observation, delivered informally
will have at least as much impact
as a formal conversation. If it’s part
of your daily routine then the
effect will be significantly greater.
A major study with school-aged
children found that they learnt
more effectively and performed
better when given feedback before
or during a learning process rather
than at the end, allowing them
space to reflect and share their
own thoughts about where the
gaps in their learning were along
the way.28
Grown-ups learn in
much the same way.
Often enough
The most effective kind of attention
is informal, frequent and irregular.
If this doesn’t happen, the research
suggests there is a minimal
threshold for the frequency of
feedback: once every two weeks.
In an analysis of safety performance
among industrial workers, whether
feedback was once a week or
once every two weeks didn’t make
any significant difference. However,
once feedback was removed
altogether and reliance was on
training and goal setting only,
safety performance dropped off
(see Fig. 8)29
.
In a separate research project,
households were set a target
to improve energy efficiency30
.
The households were given
different goals and either received
fortnightly feedback or none at
all. The effect of the feedback
was transformative (see Fig. 9).
More recent investigations within
clinical healthcare settings31
confirm that, whatever the setting,
stretching goals combined with
clear, fortnightly feedback are
strong drivers of improved
performance.
Stretching goals and fortnightly feedback
16
14
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
-2
Improvement(%)
20% goal with
frequent feedback
20% goal with
no feedback
2% goal with
no feedback
2% goal with
frequent feedback
5%
6%
-0.6%
15%
Fig.9
Source: Becker (1978)
ATTENTION
21. 21
3d.GROWTH
I AM GETTING BETTER
When we’re working towards a better future for ourselves we
deliver more along the way for everyone else.
Getting stuck sucks
Those who cannot see how their
working life can progress get stuck.
They have lowered aspirations,
diminished self-esteem, are less
engaged, perform worse and are
ultimately more likely to leave32
.
By the time they do move on,
these people are usually
considered underperformers and
no one much minds. But it needn’t
have turned out like that.
The ‘stuck’ are often as talented as
the high flyers. To maximise
performance and avoid wasting
talent, we need to get stuck
people moving again as quickly as
possible. This happens only if they
can see how their working life can
improve and what they can do to
make it better.
When promotions are scarce and
budget cuts mean there’s little
hope of pay rises, ‘moving’ needs
to mean more than moving up the
hierarchy. Progress may include
new skills, new cultural experiences,
new ways to balance home and
work (more/less travelling), job
rotations, secondments to a new
area of the business, leadership
opportunities or even a sabbatical
outside the organisation, all of
which help people ‘unstick’ and
get moving.33
22. 22 GROWTH
HR can provide career paths;
managers can show the individual
how what they are doing now will
help them realise their long-term
ambitions; but ultimately it is for
individuals themselves to decide
what would make their working life
better and to do something about it.
In a Mind Gym trial, 120
professionals in a highly regarded
consultancy took part in a short
workshop called ‘Pathfinder’ which
was billed as a way to help with
their career.
In the first few minutes the
consultants were asked to rate on
a scale of 1-10 how much they
flourished at work now and what
they thought their score would be
in three years’ time if they stayed at
the consultancy. The rest of the
workshop was spent working out
what they could do to increase the
score for three years’ time. In an
evaluation based on questionnaires
completed before, after and three
months later, there were
statistically significant shifts in a
series of measures including intent
to stay at the consultancy. Even
with such a short intervention,
some unsticking took place.
As good as it gets?
Do you think of intelligence as
something we’re born with that is
fixed, or do you think it can grow
and be improved with discipline
and practice? Researchers at
University of California, Berkeley,
ran an experiment to find out.
A group of MBA students were set
a negotiation task and given a week
to prepare. When they returned a
week later, just before they were
about to conduct the negotiation,
they were randomly allocated into
two groups. Each group was read
a paragraph of about 50 words.
One group was told that
negotiation is a fixed skill that we
acquire in childhood and that it
doesn’t change – you’re either
good at it or you’re not. The other
group was told it is something
you can get much better at
with practice.
The maximum score for the
negotiation exercise was 13,200
points. The group that was told
that negotiation is a fixed skill
scored 3,332 points. The group
that was told it was a malleable skill
scored on average 6,300 points.34
Numerous other studies have
confirmed the finding that those
with a malleable view of capability
(be it negotiation, intelligence or
even playing the violin) greatly
outperform those with a fixed
view. Building on her seminal work
defining growth mindsets,
Psychology Professor Carol Dweck
explored whether companies can
demonstrate a growth mindset.
She found that those companies
demonstrating more of a growth
mindset benefit from employees
who are 47% more likely to say their
colleagues are trustworthy, 34%
more likely to feel a strong sense of
ownership and commitment to the
company, 65% more likely to say
that the company supports risk
taking and 49% more likely to say
the company fosters innovation.35
This has two important implications:
• Managers who believe in the
ability of their people to learn
and grow will achieve more.
This means putting people in
situations where they may
make mistakes and
encouraging them to learn.
• Individuals who realise that they
can grow are more likely to
seize opportunities that will
force them to do things that
they might find uncomfortable.
This, above all, will get them
unstuck.
Mastery and playing to strengths
In order to realise our vision of a
better work life, we will need to
master skills.
In a six-year longitudinal study,
the impact of swapping a good
manager over a weak one was
The impact for teams that focus on strengths
Fig. 10
20
0
-10
10
-20
Productivity Profitability
Employee
turnover rates
%difference
Source: Asplund (2012)
Is intelligence
fixed or can you
increase it?
23. 23GROWTH
Effective coaching drives progress
Fig.11
+12% output, which compared with
+11% for the much more expensive
option of adding a new person to
the team.
The single biggest factor that
differentiated the good manager
from the weak one was the ability
to coach or educate.36
We perform at our best when we
are doing something that fits with
our strengths, motivations and
values. This means that we are
less likely to have to bend
ourselves out of shape to fit in
and so more likely to devote all
our energies to mastering skills
and getting the job done.
And this drives our performance.
One meta-analysis confirms the
benefits of creating a strength-
based organisation or team. In an
analysis of 125 companies and
over 20,000 business or work
units, those that focused on
strengths delivered significantly
greater productivity and profitability,
and lower employee turnover rates
(see Fig. 10) compared to those
that didn’t.38
Employees who use their strengths
every day are six times more likely
to be engaged at work and
managers who focus on employee
strengths will, on average, have
only 1% of their team who are
actively disengaged39
.
There are significant performance
gains for those who are willing
to change the shape of the hole
as well the peg. This means
crafting roles and shaping
challenges to suit the individuals
who will carry them out, as well
as the other way around.
Mind Gym conducted a smaller
study with the retail division of a
UK telecommunications business
and found that those managers
who had received coaching from
their line manager were also more
likely to say their performance had
improved (see graph below).
But of even greater interest is that
in the period that the coaching
was rolled out, the branches’ ability
to hit their revenue targets rose by
a whopping 29% (statistically
significant p0.5). Other benefits
included a 4% increase in
customer experience and a 7%
increase in the mid-year
engagement pulse score ‘there is
someone at work who actively
encourages my development’
(both statistically significant rises
at p0.5).
Only a fifth of employees say that they
‘have the opportunity to do what they do
best every day’ but those that do are 1.4
times more productive.37
Source: Retail division of UK Telecommunications business 2011
34%
38%
28%34%
11%
55%
Participants who believed
they improved
100%
Participants who believed
they hadn’t improved
Participants who were
unsure if they improved
Received coaching
Didn’t receive coaching
Weren’t sure
24. 24
3e.RECOGNITION
IT’S WORTH THE EFFORT
When the UK’s postal service, Royal
Mail, struggled with absenteeism,
the bosses tried a novel approach.
They launched an internal lottery
with the prize of a new car. The
only way to get a ticket was to be
at work every day for that month.
Absence fell dramatically when the
lottery was launched, and after a
few months, its frequency was
reduced from monthly to two-
monthly and then quarterly.
To the bosses’ surprise, reducing
the frequency had no impact on
attendance levels.
It’s the other guy
It would be easy if there was a
mathematical relationship
between how much effort we put
in and what we get in return. Only
employees don’t behave like other
kinds of business investment,
which explains why reducing the
frequency of the Royal Mail’s
lottery made no difference.
One of the largest predictors of
satisfaction is social comparison.
Employees who look around them
and perceive they aren’t being
recognised fairly don’t perform as
well.40
In short, we care less about
how much we’re paid in absolute
terms than how much we’re paid
in comparison to Ned at the next
desk41
. We might tell ourselves that
the question which matters is: ‘is it
worth the effort?’, but we are
actually more affected by the
answer to a different question: ‘am
I being treated fairly?’
Fair enough
‘Fair’ is in the eye of the beholder.
Is it fairer to reward based on
effort, output, need, behaviour,
loyalty, potential, progress or other
criteria? Your answer might be very
different from mine and yet neither
of us is necessarily right or wrong.
Even more troubling for those
seeking a scientific answer to the
question of fairness, is self-
enhancement bias. Most of us
think we are above average
drivers42
and overestimate our IQ43
,
94% of university professors rate
themselves as above average
teachers44
. In perceptions of
fairness the truth is only one,
often minor, factor.
Employees are far more likely to
feel that an assessment is fair
when they:
• know what they are being
assessed against in advance
• know how they are doing along
the way and so don’t get a
surprise come review time
You might be accurate to describe my
sense of humour as ‘below average’
but I’m unlikely to find it funny.
25. 25
Impact of self-regulationFig.12
0
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5
3
Self-motivation Self-regulation People
management
Cognitive
Annualprofit($m)
Below TP
Above TP
TP – the tipping point, the point at which the behaviour
has been demonstrated sufficiently by a partner to
create outstanding financial performance
• feel confident that the
assessment is on the same basis
for them as for their colleagues.
When these criteria are met
employees tend to perform
better45
. This applies very much to
underperformers, who will act to
improve on low review ratings only
if they perceive those ratings to be
fair. If they think the rating is unfair,
their performance is likely to
decrease even further – after all,
why bother?46
About me, not my manager
For recognition to feel fair, I need to
believe that it’s about me and what
I’ve achieved, not about the person
who gives it and their agenda.
The standout factor that
differentiates the most successful
partners in a major professional
services firm from the rest is
emotional self-regulation47
(see Fig. 12).
For a manager to be considered
fair, they need this kind of self-
control so they make the same
judgement about someone’s work
whatever mood they’re in.
We all have favourite colours,
clothes or holiday destinations.
In much the same way we tend
to have favourite kinds of people
to speak on behalf of the company
at a conference or lead a high
profile project.
A manager might rate a fellow
extrovert more highly than an
equally talented introvert, or give
more work to an employee they
see in the office every day rather
than one who works remotely.
Many managers are susceptible to
the generalist bias – the tendency
to reward, select and develop
people with general skills even
when complementary, specialised
skills are needed.48
A significant proportion of
managers fall prey to ‘conscious
rating distortion’ which means that
their own agendas (eg, to avoid
confrontation, promote problem
employees out of their department
RECOGNITION
Source: Boyatzis (2006)
Recognition enhances performance when
it’s about the person getting it, not the
one giving it.
26. 26
You say extrinsic, I say intrinsic
Fig.13
North American managers tend to think employees are more motivated by extrinsic rewards (pay,
medical benefits), whereas Latin American and Asian managers expect their teams to be intrinsically
motivated (finding the job enjoyable and interesting).
In this instance, the North American managers seem to be mistaken. Employees consistently report being
more intrinsically than extrinsically motivated all over the world. This is good news as intrinsic motivations
are more robust predictors of performance.50
or look good as a manager) are
influencing who they recognise.
Understandably, this makes their
decisions seem rather unfair (to
put it mildly).49
Recognition
enhances performance when
it’s about the person getting it,
not the one giving it.
A decent difference
For recognition to increase
performance there needs to be
sufficient difference between top
performers, steady players and the
laggards. In other words, it’s worth
being one of the best.
Two of the most common traps
when recognising people are
centrality bias (‘we’re all average’),
and leniency bias (‘we’re all above
average’). In each case the
difference between top and
bottom is slight. Although these
tend to be adopted to avoid
upsetting someone and running
the risk that performance will drop
off, they have the opposite effect.
Both lead to a decline in overall
performance and most particularly
for star players who don’t feel
appreciated.51
Recognition is more effective
when it is distributed closer to a
bell curve. The way to achieve this
is for managers to talk with each
other about the performance of
their people. This can be driven
through a centrally imposed,
forced or guided distribution
curve; it can happen in formal
inter-rating meetings often
facilitated by the manager of the
managers; or it can be achieved
in informal conversations
throughout the year.
Whichever route, and there are
pros and cons for each. It will
succeed only when managers
realise that. Without a decent
enough differentiation they are
not going to maximise the
performance of their own team,
even if that means making some
tough calls.
RECOGNITION
Fig.14
Consistent differentiation
Low
1 2 3 4
High
5
Numberofpeople
Performance rating
Leniency biasCentrality bias
Fairer distribution
Source: Prendergast (1999); Bretz, Milkovich and Read (1992)
27. 27
3f.CHOICE
I CAN DECIDE
You can’t always choose your circumstances but you can choose
how you think about them and what you do as a result.
I choose how to explain
something
If something bad happens, is it
a one-off or is it a sign of a much
wider and more enduring problem?
The answer to this question
indicates whether you have
adopted an optimistic or a
pessimistic (aka ‘realistic’)
explanatory style.52
High performers will be agile
and move between the two
explanatory styles. They will adopt
the more optimistic explanation
for daily setbacks which they will
see as temporary and specific to
this situation (rather than long-
lasting and applying in many
situations). On the other hand,
they will regard success as
evidence of their capability to
succeed again when faced with
any number of new challenges.
With a stronger sense of self-
efficacy (I believe I can succeed)
they are more likely to view
challenging problems as tasks to
be mastered. As a result, they
recover more quickly from setbacks
and disappointments53
and keep
performing effectively for longer.54
Optimists achieve more, live longer and
have better relationships. They are also
wrong more often.
28. 28
Only when the consequences of
getting it wrong would be severe
do they switch to a more
pessimistic explanation.
I choose what to do
A major reorganisation is
announced. You hear on the
grapevine that your role will be
up for consideration but no one
seems to know quite when it will
be known, what the criteria are or
what else is happening.
Do you wait or do you act?
Perhaps you start making your own
inquiries internally, burnish your
resumé and search for suitable jobs
externally, or complete your
current project early to show what
value you bring.
Those of us with an internal locus
of control concentrate on what we
can do rather than worry about
what we can’t affect.55
This bias to act means that we are
more likely to keep going whatever
happens, with beneficial
consequences for how we feel as
well as how much we achieve.
A sympathetic manager can help
increase our internal locus by, for
example, offering options, keeping
to an agreed cadence for reporting
on progress and letting us try new
things out. Best of all, they can
provide the support when we
need it.
I choose to seek support
The heroes in books and films
often succeed alone. In the real
world it’s more likely to be the
opposite. Top performers know
where to go to for support and
aren’t afraid to use whatever
resources they can.
The best networks will be broad
covering technical, practical and
emotional support, although rarely
all from the same source.56
People with a dense web of
relationships containing both
‘expressive ties’ (friends providing
social support) and ‘instrumental
ties’ (supervisors, peers and
mentors providing ‘expert’ support)
have a greater readiness for
change and continue to perform
better however much turbulence
they encounter57
.
A manager needs to provide
support for all their team by, for
example, protecting a team
member from excessive scrutiny
or unfair judgement and holding
steady when performance wobbles.
However, for the best results, the
manager needs to make extra
effort for recent arrivals who don’t
know the company’s mores and
will need help and time to build
their own support networks.
Without this support new hires are
more likely to flounder, which has
both an immediate impact on
performance and a longer term
effect on the ability to grow by
bringing in fresh talent.
Grit is it
People with grit, as in the passion
and perseverance to pursue
long-term goals58
, not only
CHOICE
Fig.15
Those high in ‘grit’ were:
Source: Duckworth et al. (2009)
20%
more likely to have career
changes than their peers
more likely to pursue further
education than their peers23%
more likely to complete
summer training at West Point
Academy (US Military)
99%
more likely to reach the
later rounds in the National
Spelling Bee contest
41%
I can’t make the weather but I can pack
a waterproof.
29. 29
ride out the rough times but
emerge from them stronger
and performing better. Setbacks
don’t set them back.
Grit is a better predictor of later
success than many other factors,
including IQ and
conscientiousness.59
The extent to which grit can be
learnt is the source of lively
academic debate. What is clear is
that people who demonstrate grit
are more likely to give optimistic
explanations for events, focus on
what they can do rather than what
is outside their control and draw
on whomever and whatever they
need for support. These are all
behaviours that we can learn and
managers can help to develop.
A role for HR too
Most big companies have
something called ‘competencies’,
which set out the skills people
need to do their job well.
In low turbulence environments,
companies that concentrate on
building competence will
outperform. However, in
environments where change
is constant and the environment
is volatile, this could be a
mistaken priority.
In turbulent times, the high
performing teams concentrated
on a mix of three elements: the
ability to take a dramatically
different course from the norm
(agility), solid routines that provide
a first response in the face of
unexpected turbulence (practical
habits) and the foresight to take
pre-emptive action before
turbulence hits (behavioural
preparedness) (see Fig. 16).60
As a result, they kept learning
and growing.
In contrast, companies that stuck
to a competence focus during
turbulent times saw a considerable
drop in performance.
Keeping it up
While all six conditions will get
people to the top of their game,
‘Choice’ is the condition that gives
people the greatest chance of
staying there. When times get
tough, the more choices we feel
we have the more likely we are to
keep going.
Fig.16 Impact in low/high turbulent environments
0.6
0.4
0.2
0
-0.2
-0.4
Changeinperformance(%)
Low turbulence High turbulence
0.17
0.12
0.22
0.48
0.21 0.22 0.21
-0.24
CHOICE
Source: Akgün Keskin (2014)
Agility: the ability to take a dramatically different course from the norm
Practical habits: solid routines that provide a first response in the face
of unexpected turbulence
Behavioural preparedness: the foresight to take pre-emptive action
before turbulence hits
Competence focus
30. 30
Some people do damage without meaning to.
They may be too paralysed with anxiety to make
any significant decision or be in a role for which they
lack the necessary skills. A poor IT programmer can
do disproportionate harm to the work of a team of
highly proficient ones. This isn’t malicious but it can
be disastrous. In these situations, it’s the manager’s
responsibility to remove them from danger quickly
and so not allow them to become a drain on the
team’s efforts or the manager’s time.
Far harder to spot and to manage are those whose
intentions are malicious – snakes in suits with a covert
agenda to disrupt, sabotage and undermine to gain
personal advantage. Whether it’s fire-fighting their
sabotage attempts or simply worrying about how to
keep them in their box (slim chance), these people
sap energy, misdirect resources and, at the extreme,
can bring down everyone who comes close.
As a manager, their behaviour is not your fault.
They are adults and they are making choices which
have consequences. However, it is your responsibility
to address the issue and prevent their behaviour from
denting your team’s performance.
Here are a few of the more common tricky types
and what a manager might do about them.
Credit thief
Also known as the ‘buck passer’, they will demand full
plaudits for any achievement they had the remotest
connection to and will quickly find someone else to
blame as soon as anything goes wrong.
What to watch out for: Hearing about the great things
they have done rather than what they’ve learnt from
past mistakes, and the great things they are committed
to doing.
What to do: Be parsimonious in recognition for them
but generous with others. Agree on specific
challenges that they are accountable for, provide clear
escalation for them to use if at any stage they think
they aren’t going to succeed, and pay forensic
attention so you’re fully aware of exactly what’s going
on. They need to know you’re onto them.
Self-anointed star
Possibly too scared to show weakness or vulnerability
and exhibiting narcissistic tendencies they act as if
they can do no wrong. They may even believe it.
What to watch out for: Your attempts at coaching get
lots of nods but nothing ever changes.
What to do: Give them plenty of challenge, pushing
them into realms where they’re likely to falter in
4. TRICKY
CHARACTERS
The assumption in this report is that people who come to work
want to do a decent enough job, or at least not do harm. In the
vast majority of cases this is true. But there are exceptions.
31. 31
their confidence. When this happens, use recognition
and growth to reinforce their progress, helping
them understand that learning from setbacks is an
attribute you value highly. Give overt recognition
to colleagues who have clearly made mistakes
and corrected them well.
Mid-career prisoner (MCP)
Savvy and often with a long service record, they see
younger people promoted above them and sense
that their career has peaked. With little experience
elsewhere, they plan to stay put until they can take
early retirement. But instead of working to grow the
company, their energies have turned to undermining
the new leadership by whom they feel betrayed.
What to watch out for: They don’t contribute much
in meetings and when they do it can be tinged with
sarcasm or showing up mistakes that senior leaders
have made (but could have avoided if only the MCP
had been asked). They might inquire about
opportunities to develop and progress, but whatever
you offer it’s never quite right.
What to do: Show them what their working life will
amount to if they continue as they are now. Help
create conditions for their growth by understanding
what they want in life and how, by working with you,
they can increase their chances of getting it.
Offer practical opportunities such as sideway moves,
increased responsibility, shadowing or job crafting in
return for emotional commitment. Remind them of
the beneficial impact that their work has to increase a
sense of purpose. Double the recognition when you
see a renewed energy from them.
Trouble-maker
If you have a psychopath on your team, you won’t
change them. Get rid of them as quickly as you can.
However, there are plenty of trouble-makers without
such an extreme pathology.
What to watch out for: Are they looking for attention
or looking to conquer? If it’s the former, they will
change when they are clear that your recognition
goes only to the positive behaviours. If it’s the latter,
you may notice that people in your team who were
once hard-working and open have started to ease off
and keep their distance from you.
What to do: Give more of your time and attention
to the people who are doing a good job and rise
above minor issues. If the situation looks more
serious, accept that it may be beyond your own
capability as a manager, turn your attention back
to the rest of your team, and seek help from
professionals such as HR and legal.
I didn’t get where I am today by…
The notion that change is best done top down is,
at best, unproven and in today’s more social, less
reverential society almost certainly out of date. Yes,
it helps if the boss at the top models what you want
everyone else to do but it is far from essential.
What to watch out for: What do the most senior
people care about? If there is a way of aligning their
ambitions, say to leave a legacy or pass on to a new
generation, then there’s a chance. For many ‘old dogs’
there is little appetite for new tricks.
What to do: Let the senior ‘stuck in the muds’ know
what you’re up to and ask them not to get in the way,
but don’t expect them to change too much
themselves. Instead, focus on the level below who are
more likely to be ambitious for advancement and
make it clear that managing people well is one of the
surest ways to realise their career dreams.
I haven’t got time for all this people stuff
Management has, for so long, been regarded as an
‘add-on’ that comes with promotion but without any
lessening of individual targets, that some people will
regard any extra duties as an unrealistic imposition.
They may have seen their bosses rise up the hierarchy
without giving too much attention to ‘people stuff’
and be affronted that the rules of the game appear to
have changed.
What to watch out for: a reputation for strong
individual performance and technical expertise with
little evidence of collaboration or leaning in to help
others out.
What to do: Option 1: show how by getting the
people management bit right they will be more
successful and have greater career prospects, ie,
appeal to self-interest. Also, make it very clear that
managing people well does not require more time,
just using the time you have with people differently.
Option 2: if they don’t, or won’t, get it, design roles so
that technical experts don’t need to manage people
to be seen to be successful.
TRICKY CHARACTERS
32. 32
What to stop
Stop tinkering (or worse) with the performance
management system. If there are minor aspects that
are causing extreme disruption or sending out
contrary signals, change them quickly. Then leave the
system well alone. If you’re starting with nothing, or a
performance management machinery that’s in
disrepair, put in the basics quickly and then turn your
energy to encouraging the right behaviours.
Stop using measures of compliance with the process
as the basis for assessing how well performance
is being managed. Try to keep to a minimum blanket
emails telling people they’ve got only two days left to
enter their goals.
Stop talking about performance management as if it
is a system or a process and, instead, talk about the six
conditions: where they exist already and how to
create them where they don’t.
Just in case you’re still doing this, stop promoting
technically excellent individuals into people
management roles without assessing their aptitude.
This may mean having fewer, better people managers
with more direct reports (and fewer additional
responsibilities).
What to start
Start talking about creating conditions for people to
flourish and perform at the top of their game. Make
this the basis for the language that senior leaders use
to discuss talent, culture and performance. Encourage
them to give examples of when and how they have
experienced the different conditions and what they do
to maintain them.
Start to tell managers that you expect them to
create these conditions and give them the right kind
of support to do so (see ‘what to continue’ below).
Start measuring the extent to which the conditions
exist, either as part of your company’s employee
survey or separately. Make sure you analyse the data
to assess difference by team, or groups of teams who
share the same KPIs. Start to correlate performance
against the conditions.
What to continue
We hope that your company is one of the thousands
who already use Mind Gym to build capabilities and
change behaviour for the better. If so, please continue
with this (and if not, we hope the fact you’ve read this
far means that you’ll give us a go).
Mind Gym’s team of psychologists have developed a
series of 90-minute workouts for both individuals and
managers that will help them create each of the
conditions, jointly and severally.
Every session is grounded in research and taps into
the fundamental question – what’s in it for me? The
workouts also address the underlying psychological
barriers people have to approaching performance
conversations as well as giving people practical skills
they can apply immediately.
Over one million managers and employees in 50
countries have taken part in a Mind Gym session so
they have been fully tested before they get to you.
5. MAKING IT
HAPPEN
33. Six
conditions PURPOSE CHALLENGE ATTENTION
For leaders Talk about why the work
the company does matters
and who ultimately benefits
as a result.
Set stretching goals for
yourself and the company
and be willing to celebrate
when people do well against
them, even if they don’t quite
hit them.
Spend time with customers
and team members. Tell the
stories about what you
observe. Find ways to
demonstrate that you know
what your teams are up to.
Recognise specific examples
of behaviour rather than just
achievements.
For
managers
Tell people about the impact
that their work has had and
show how they are
contributing to team and
company objectives.
Engage in discussion about
goals to help people feel that
they are ‘just about’ possible.
Review goals frequently to
check they are still
appropriately stretching. Don’t
expect people to feel
comfortable about their goals
when they are agreed.
Be sure your feedback is
descriptive, not just evaluative.
Find creative ways to pay
attention to larger, dispersed
teams and gather feedback
from those they work with.
For
employees
What do you care about?
Why did you join this
company? Who is better off
as a result of your work?
Reflect on what drives you
and how to get it at work.
When agreeing goals with
your manager confirm
how achieving this goal
will contribute to the
organisation’s success.
Take an active role in shaping
your goals so that that they
interest and inspire you. Be
willing, or eager, to take on
challenges that you don’t know
that you can achieve.
Keep in mind that people giving
feedback have positive
intentions to help. If they didn’t
care about your success they
wouldn’t bother giving
feedback at all. Always ask for
tips on how to improve. Don’t
shy away from giving feedback
to peers, and encourage them
to replicate the favour.
For HR
functions
Reinforce the vision and
purpose of the organisation
through all communication.
Ensure that people
performance is less about
process, more about
motivation.
Keep goal setting simple; don’t
kill the cognitive process by
drowning it in forms and tick
boxes. Allow for people who
miss very stretching goals to
be recognised as much, or
more, as those who exceed
easier ones.
Place less emphasis on
mid-year and year-end reviews,
promoting a culture of
continuous improvement and
descriptive feedback. Update
feedback training to place
greater emphasis on informal,
descriptive feedback and
support managers in how to
pay more attention.
34. 34
GROWTH RECOGNITION CHOICE
Take time to share your story with your
employees, you weren’t always top dog
and it inspires people to hear how you
worked your way through the ranks.
Progress never stops. Take time for you
and the leadership team to develop
your own careers and reflect
on the future.
Tackle underperformance discreetly
but unequivocally and make sure that
top performers get their fair share of
limelight.
Reflect on where it’s possible to give
people autonomy and ownership
and where boundaries are necessary.
When you share plans also explain
the choices people have in how to
implement them.
As time is precious, try setting aside
1:1s each month specifically focused on
career coaching with your direct
reports. Explore opportunities to
build skills and experience, not just
traditional promotions.
Understand each of your team and
what they’re motivated by. Ensure the
process and communication feels fair
and consistent and watch out for your
own personal biases. End-of-year
reviews should feel part of an ongoing
conversation, not a big surprise.
Be open with your team, sharing
mistakes, risks, successes, challenges
and opportunities. Reframe failure
as an opportunity to learn and share
examples of your own. Create peer
networks so everyone has a variety
of support to call on when times
get tough.
Be open to all opportunities. Build a
network, as the more people you know,
the more opportunities will find their
way to you. And if you don’t know what
you want? Take time to reflect on what
you’re good at, what you enjoy and the
type of life you want to be living in five
or ten years’ time.
Be the change you want to see.
Thank, celebrate and recognise
team performance as well as great
work from individuals. And tell your
manager what you need from them
to keep you motivated and
performing at your best.
Build a strong network with people
you trust and call on them when you
need support. When things are
tough, remember that you always
have a choice and usually many
more than you realise.
Create how-to guides for managers.
Establish a requirement that hiring
managers put together a possible
career trajectory for new hires so they
have a sense of the opportunities that
lie ahead. Promote lateral moves,
secondments and shadowing.
Offer managers multiple ways of
recognising and rewarding teams as
well as individual performance. Have
very clear guidelines on how to deal
with underperformance and support
managers through applying them.
Promote a culture of ‘failing fast’
where mistakes are celebrated. Run a
‘naked HR’ campaign to demystify
some of the people processes and
reduce the scepticism around getting
fired, hired and promoted.
MAKING IT HAPPEN
35. 35 MAKING IT HAPPEN
MIND GYM’S PROVEN 90 MINUTE WORKOUTS
FOR MANAGERS
Make it
matter
Help other people see how and why their work matters
so they’re proud to say what they do.
Performance
management –
why bother?
When it comes to transforming performance,
there is a magic bullet. It’s called performance
management. No successful organisation can be without
it. Even better, it doesn’t cost a penny.
Goal setting
Set goals that will stretch your team members and
motivate them to perform at their best.
Peak
performance
Imagine the boost to your team’s performance if you
could turn all of your steady performers into stars.
Held to
account
Help your team to take ownership for their own best
performance so you can watch them shine without the
fear of it all going wrong.
Great
feedback
We explore how we can use positive and negative
feedback to reinforce or change the behaviour
of others.
Courageous
conversations
Prepare yourself to face difficult conversations with
courage and confidence. Discover how to master your
emotions and stay in control.
PURPOSE
CHALLENGE
ATTENTION
36. TO HELP YOU CREATE THE SIX CONDITIONS
Rate success
Drive better results and increase personal
motivation through assigning an objective
performance rating.
Rewarding
Money talks, but it needs to say the right thing.
Discover how to reinforce the behaviours you
want to see, without having
to spend a penny.
True grit
A huge part of sustaining high performance
comes down to sheer perseverance. Master
the art of flying in the face of sometimes
unrelenting adversity.
Building
bridges
Be the architect that creates a sense of belonging
for everyone.
Shaping
futures
Understand where we are, where we’re going,
and how we can get the best out of ourselves
and our team.
Play to
strength
Fight the natural inclination to focus on
weaknesses and learn how to get more energy,
vigour and commitment from your team.
Performance
coaching
Win your team’s affections and the boss’s respect
by supercharging your coaching approach.
GROWTH
CHOICE
RECOGNITION
37. 37
Goal
setting
Development
planning
Mid-year
End-of-year
reviews
Manager
sessions
Goal setting
Shaping
futures
Held to
account
Rate success
Employee
sessions
Give me
strength
Pathfinder Find your mojo Home truths
MAKING IT HAPPEN
Find your mojo
Leap out of bed each and every morning by
connecting with what really matters to you.
Home truths
Proactively seeking feedback, and knowing how
to make the most of what you hear, means you’ll
never dread receiving it again.
Pathfinder
Get more of what you want from your
working life by taking control and opening
up your options.
Give me
strength
Being able to identify and understand our
strengths can help us get more energy from our
everyday lives.
Bounce back
You’ve missed the bus, again. Your office is
making cutbacks. Learn how to bounce back
from the everyday setbacks that life throws at us,
and come out even stronger.
FOR EVERYONE
Just-in-time performance development
To support your people at exactly the right moment and address performance before it becomes a problem,
we can match sessions to your annual performance cycle. An example is illustrated below:
PURPOSE/CHALLENGE
GROWTH/
RECOGNITION
CHOICE
ATTENTION
38. 38
CASESTUDY
In 2010, the purchase of Alico increased
MetLife’s employee base to 65,000 and its
customer base to 90 million. To compete
on this new global stage MetLife would
need to become a world-class company,
operating flawlessly in all of its locations and
developing its top talent to lead the way.
But company surveys found a number
of roadblocks:
• inconsistencies in performance
management across the business
• goals recorded for less than 30% of
employees
• middle-of-the-road performers being
promoted while top talent was
sandbagged
• bonuses failing to recognise the
company’s stars
They also found that, to really drive top
performance, a more motivational
leadership style was needed, rather than the
traditional, authoritative approach.
Working with MetLife, Mind Gym designed
two global programmes to help people
leaders handle the entire performance
management cycle – from setting goals and
coaching, to assessing performance and
understanding biases – as well as giving them
the tools to transform themselves from
authoritarian managers to motivational
leaders.
Within six weeks, the sessions were rolled
out at scale in nine different languages.
To ensure global consistency while adding
local context, Mind Gym also trained 150
MetLife facilitators to deliver the programmes.
By the end of the programme, 98% of all
employees had goals listed in the internal
public system, payouts to low performers
had decreased by 63% while higher-
performer payouts had increased by 33%,
and of the 2,652 people leaders who gave
feedback, 83% were successfully using their
new skills. In fact, pre- and post-programme
surveys showed a significant uplift in
competencies across the board.
“Mind Gym provided the vital few ingredients that took our
approach from average to outstanding. Our end product
inspired managers to grow, change and develop in ways that
we have not experienced in the past. Mind Gym were innovative,
flexible, knowledgeable, and fun to partner with.”
Rachel Lee, Global Talent, MetLife
Helping 6000 people leaders become world-class motivators
Giving
feedback23%
Career
conversations17%
Performance
conversations17%
Overcoming
rating biases
93%
95%
Evidence-
based ratings
91%
Sharing challenging messages
39. 39
CASESTUDY In 2013, Microsoft introduced a new
approach to Performance Development,
retiring traditional ‘Performance
Management’. The company changed the
primary focus from ‘evaluating’ employees
to helping people continually improve. The
company was on the verge of changing, and
with it internal dynamics including much
greater interdependencies, different
development cycles, and changes to the
role of people managers. It was critical to
shift how people worked, changing focus
from individual tasks to delivering impact
through team work.
The solution was an entirely new approach:
performance was redefined as ‘impact’ with
emphasis on ‘impact gained with and
through others’. Ratings and rankings were
retired. Reflection and feedback would be
more frequent to enable more agile
learning, growth and adjustments. ‘Connect’
discussions between managers and
employees were introduced with flexibility
for business teams to decide the timing and
rhythm that made sense for them. Annual
rewards would recognise impact but there
would be no annual review.
Conversations replaced a system, and
12,000 managers needed to be equipped
with the tools to make it happen.
Mind Gym designed a series of bite-size
workouts to build managers’ capabilities
to give frequent growth-oriented feedback,
manage for continual improvement and
reward impact. These were complemented
by supporting sessions on actionable
feedback and coaching.
So far, in 500 sessions, 10,000 managers
at Microsoft have undergone a Mind Gym
experience.
And the numbers say it all. In 2012, 45% of
the workforce was dissatisfied with the
performance system. In 2014, with the new
approach, this fell to 16%, with 67% feeling
positively about it.
In 2012, 49% of managers felt the
performance management system had
a negative/very negative impact on
collaboration. In 2014, after one year in
the new approach, this dropped to 3%,
with 70% answering that the new approach
had a positive/very positive impact on
collaboration across the company.
Performance management at Microsoft – replacing a flawed
system with a culture of collaboration and growth
“Introducing a change like this doesn’t happen without a huge
amount and variety of internal and external partnerships.
There was a massive cross-team effort to design, introduce
and land something that had so little resemblance to traditional
approaches. Manager capability is a cornerstone in an approach
like this and ensuring it enables Microsoft’s evolving culture.”
Lisa Dodge, Global Performance Development, Microsoft and
Peter Heller, Senior Director, Global Learning Development, Microsoft
40. 40
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REFERENCES
46. Know more
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