Goal setting can be an effective way of increasing productivity in the workplace. It gives workers something to aim for and, linked to performance related pay, it can tap into extra effort.
That’s the ideal scenario, but it can go wrong if it’s implemented badly. Michelle Brown, Associate Professor at the Department of Management & Marketing at the University of Melbourne, says problems start when the benefits are oversold to employees. In theory, more pay for hitting objectives can turn to cynicism when employees realise that the goals are unlikely to be achieved because they don’t have the resources to meet them.
Cynicism is like a disease — once acquired you’d assume people’s behaviour will become destructive and have the opposite to the intended impact of the performance appraisal scheme. In this edition of BTalk I ask Michelle if that’s the case and, if confronted with the problem with your staff, how do you fix the issue?
The bad news for managers is that it all involves time — time spent tracking performance through the year and time spent ensuring the right objectives are set in the first place. But there again, isn’t managing people the main function of a manager’s job?
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Rates jump, Boris’ near miss, RBA today
Boris Johnson had his leadership challenged and markets liked it. Less so when he won. But NAB’s Tapas Strickland says politics tends to have a fleeting influence. Meanwhile, the RBA is expected to raise rates by 25 basis points this afternoon.
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Fibre over the ditch
While Australia argues about the merits of rolling out a $43 billion fibre-to-the-home network, a similar debate rages over the ditch in New Zealand.
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Protect, Perish or Prosper?
The world is getting smaller. We need to embrace it, but the question is, do we need to protect ourselves from it too?
