Performance improvement meetings are a meeting between an employee and supervisor to discuss the employee's performance and work towards correcting identified issues. It is often accompanied by a letter of counseling/warning to provide details of the performance issues in writing.
This article outlines some guidelines for how to perform a performance improvement meeting.
If you have any questions about this or a related topic please reach out to us at hr@workforcewins.com.
Do's and Don'ts
- Always reinforce the Company’s genuine desire to make the employment arrangement work through the process.
- Have any documents ready for the meeting.
- Have someone in the meeting aside from you and the Employee.
- Hold the meeting in a private room.
- Have a clear meeting process in mind. (A sample is provided below.)
- Don’t get defensive. Answer questions as calmly and clearly as possible.
- Don’t apologize.
- Don’t let it get personal. Always talk about behaviors, skills or fit versus "you are too this" or "you can’t do that".
- Remain professional and kind.
Sample Meeting Process
- Welcome: ‘Thank you for coming’.
- Outline the purpose of the meeting: ‘We are meeting to discuss an/some important concern(s) that the Company has with your performance.’
- Cut to the point: ‘It is our genuine desire to make this employment arrangement work.’ [If there is a letter: ‘So, we have summarized the Company’s position in a Letter of Counseling / Warning to make sure that we are fully on the same page.’]
- Review the Contents of the Letter/Script: Summarize the concern(s). [If there is a letter or script, summarize or read the full text per your read of the situation.]
- Next Steps: Review the next steps in the performance improvement process. [If there is a letter, they will be outlined there.]
- Questions: ‘Do you have any questions? If any questions arise please let me know and we will do our best to address them.’
- Thank you: ‘Thank you for your time and we look forward to moving forward together.’