HR Basics FAQ

Our strong recommendation is that you sign up for the Employee Engagement Certification Course first and use the HR Power Centre as an implementation guide as you decide which initiatives are priority for your organization. At the same time, you can also get tremendous benefit using the HR Power Centre to deal with the inevitable everyday people issues that come up while you implement the drivers of Employee Engagement that will improve your organization’s profitability.

Responsibility for people management differs from company to company, depending on the size of the company, the structure, available resources etc. In some companies, the owner/manager will take a personal interest in driving these initiatives and this almost always ensures success. It’s not unusual to delegate responsibility to the office manager or to the senior manager’s assistant if that position exists. If your organization is implementing our Employee Engagement model, it is important that an administrator be assigned responsibility to ensure that training is completed and progress in implementation is monitored.

This is a good question and is a function of how quickly managers and supervisors complete the Employee Engagement Certification Course and start using HR Power Centre tools to activate Employee Engagement drivers in the business. Progress can be measured on a regular basis using the measurement tools provided by TGS.

It makes sense to give one person overall responsibility for managing the implementation of Employee Engagement training In addition, it sends the message that Employee Engagement is strategically important to the company and there is commitment to getting it done properly. However, all managers, supervisors as well as employees have responsibility for executing Employee Engagement initiatives. The active support of top management in the company is critical.

Objective setting should start at the top of the organization with annual corporate objectives being set by the senior management team. Once the corporation knows where it is going, objectives that support the corporate objectives are established by the various levels in the company until finally, managers sit with their employees and work out individual objectives for the year. If done properly, all employees should understand how the accomplishment of their objectives contributes to the company achieving its objectives. The “Building People Management Skills” module of the Employee Engagement Certification Course outlines the skills a manager or supervisor must learn and practice to be effective in setting objectives with employees.

There is a process that should be followed when setting performance objectives with employees. Once again, the Employee Engagement Certification Course offers the essential training and the HR Power Centre provides the direction needed to implement solutions. Following our process will result in employees agreeing to objectives that are specific, measurable, attainable, results-oriented and time-bound and, most importantly, relate back to the organization’s objectives.

All relevant documents and directions are downloadable from the HR Power Centre. For instance if you were dealing with the Behavioral Competencies aspect of creating a job description, you would download the Competencies Questionnaire and have the employee compete it with direction from you if necessary. Using this downloading/sharing approach, you should have no difficulty getting your employees involved appropriately

You are absolutely correct. Once the top five competencies for a position have been agreed to using the Competencies Questionnaire, they are entered on the job description and the related Competencies Assessment Sheets are attached to the employee’s EPR. You will then want to share with the employee the “Competencies with Observable Behaviors” for the five competencies relevant to his/her job so they know what these behaviors look like in action. By observing the employee throughout the rating period, the manager will be in a position to rate the employee on the competencies when the annual review rolls around. When setting performance objectives with your employee for the first time, there should be one on behavioral improvement. You may want to have the employee commit to a competency improvement objective with which they are comfortable using the Competencies with Observable Behaviors as a guide. At the end of the first rating period, the manager will have enough observable data to set the next year’s competencies improvement objective so that actual observed deficiencies are addressed.

The Personal Action Plan (PAP) form is used by Managers and Supervisors to capture their commitment around improving their People Management Skills. The “Building People Management Skills” module of the Employee Engagement Certification Course was designed specifically to highlight for the manager or supervisor completing it, those areas where they might want to concentrate on to improve their skill levels. Once the PAP is complete and approved by their manager, it should be recorded as one of their objectives on their Employee Performance Review along with other performance objectives agreed to and be the subject of regular progress reviews/coaching during the rating period. The PAP form and the Guide for its completion appear in the “Setting Performance Objectives” of the HR Basics module as well as in the “People Management Skills” section of the Performance Management module.