Improve Employee Performance Idea 98 – February 9, 2010: Link Personal Responsibility to Greater Autonomy

So you want your employees to take greater personal responsibility for correcting mistakes.  Why not make a connection between personal responsibility and greater autonomy.  How?  Try this idea:

Focus on Greater Control of the Solution:  When employees don’t take personal responsibility for correcting mistakes, you or someone else has to be the initiator for making sure the correction is made. This means that the employee loses control of his or her ability to decide on a solution as well as when and how it will be implemented.

So the next time you have an employee who wants to let someone else “fix the problem,” explain the connection between correcting mistakes and greater autonomy (or less micro-management).

KEY REMINDER:  To improve employee performance, you have to conduct effective performance discussions, give effective performance feedback, reinforce employee performance, and use effective performance phrases to write effective performance appraisals. 
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Barbara Brown, Ph.D. shows managers how to improve employee performance by linking performance to results. She publishes handbooks that contain phrases for discussing performance and for writing appraisals. Dr. Brown also provides training and consulting. Visit www.LinkToResults.net.