6 Topics to Discuss in Every Performance Review

An insightful, well-planned performance review can play a vital role in encouraging employee development. When done properly, it can also foster growth, engagement, and clear communication.

There is more to a performance review than asking basic questions, however. Goals and achievements, challenges and successes are only part of the conversation. There are broader topics to be addressed as well, if you want to get real insights and propel your teams forward in the best possible way. 

Here are six key topics that the perfect performance evaluation should address. By covering each of them thoroughly, you’ll give employees valuable insights that will help them make steady progress throughout the next review period.

Navigation

1. Topic 1: Employee Behaviour
2. Topic 2: Measurable Results
3. Topic 3: Employee Success
4. Topic 4: Ways to Overcome Challenges
5. Topic 5: Employee Goals and Ambitions
6. Topic 6: Feedback on the Organization
7. Primalogik’s Employee Performance Review Software makes employee reviews easier

Topic 1: Employee Behaviour

Personality traits are extremely difficult to evaluate objectively. Values-based performance reviews, which evaluate behaviors as they relate to company values, are increasingly popular, but still face challenges with subjectivity and unclear metrics.

Focusing on more easily measurable employee behaviours instead will allow you to have a conversation around factual events indicating how an employee’s behavior is affecting their performance.

Discussing behaviors that are based on simple events is a practical and effective approach. Give examples of specific actions that have benefited the team, and encourage employees to do those things more. Here are a few examples of positive behaviours:

• Checks in on a daily basis with direct reports.
• Produces clear visuals showing project results and shares them with the team. 
• Delegates effectively and asks for help when needed.

Additionally, managers can make a note of behaviors that need to improve, giving examples of what you would like employees to be doing.

How to address tricky topics like behavior

Almost 60% of millennial workers believe their managers are unprepared to give constructive feedback during performance reviews. Communicating an important message in the wrong way can backfire, and leave you worse off than where you started. But with the right preparation, anyone can discuss even the trickiest topics with ease. 

First, get familiar with common pain points in performance reviews and learn how to address them. Next, learn how to express yourself to employees in a clear and personable manner using appropriate performance review phrases. Following professional tips and taking the time to practice effective communication will help you perform better, and stay focused.

Now, where were we?

Topic 2: Measurable Results

Managers can also review the results of past projects to determine whether an employee’s contributions are increasing at the desired pace. Tracking results using OKRs or implementing cascading goals will give you clear metrics that measure progress, so your discussion can be grounded in facts. Even when looking at numbers, it’s important to give employees a chance to share input on their actions and results, too. They might describe factors that influenced a project’s success that you weren’t aware of, for instance. Listening and considering this feedback will help you gain the full picture of how a project played out. You can also encourage them to prepare themselves by learning what to say in a performance review, so that they feel ready and able to communicate what matters to them in an appropriate way.

Topic 3: Employee Success

A performance review is the right place to paint a vivid picture of what excelling in the employee’s role looks like. Go over key performance indicators (KPIs) of success. Then, point out ways in which employees reflect that high level of performance as well as ways in which they need to improve. Employees who receive recognition from their supervisors or managers are 69% more likely to do better work.

By taking the time to focus on successes, you can keep the tone positive even while discussing needs for further development. It’s a highly effective way to help employees see themselves transforming in ways that are attainable so they can match an image of success in their role. It’s also a great way to help them worry less at the prospect of a performance review. 

Topic 4: Ways to Overcome Challenges

Many managers dread having to discuss challenges or poor performance. This is in part responsible for the growing emphasis on upgrading performance reviews to encompass more global concepts, such as employee development, dialogue and engagement, as opposed to more traditional approaches that focused more strictly on reaching specific targets of production or achievement.

You may want to check out our article outlining 8 tactics for improving your formal review process if you think this might be a concern in your company.

Once you identify areas where employees need to grow, ask them what challenges they are facing. Work to pinpoint the specific knowledge and skills they need to develop to excel in their role and progress in their career. Ask employees what types of learning experiences they feel they’ll benefit most from. Then, connect them with resources that will help them to grow the desired knowledge and skills, like training, mentoring, or coaching. 

Topic 5: Employee Goals and Ambitions

An employee review is also a good time to ask employees about their broader career ambitions, so you can play a role in helping them stay on the right path and improve their professional satisfaction.

It’s also important to discuss more short-term goals and objectives, especially for the next performance review period. These will vary depending on whether you are conducting a mid-year review, a quarterly review, or a 90-day review. Research reveals that employees who play a central role in setting their own goals tend to be four times more engaged than other employees.

Finally, remind them of how these goals and their projects support the organizational vision and mission, so that they have a sense of their own place within the bigger picture. 

Topic 6: Feedback on the Organization

Last but not least, give employees the chance to offer feedback about their organization, team, and manager. A supervisor evaluation asks how managers perform in key areas that represent the most important traits of leadership. When employees have a chance to address factors that influence their performance, from leaders to team dynamics to workplace well-being, you’ll gain valuable input that will help you make positive organisation-wide changes.

When both employees and managers have a chance to weigh in with feedback, the review will feel more like a conversation, too—which is usually more comfortable for both employees and managers. One-on-one meetings should always involve two-way communication for optimal outcomes. 

If employees aren’t prepared or comfortable giving feedback on this topic, you can ask specific questions, such as:

• How could workflow improve within your team?
• What resources could help you to do your job better?
• How could we work to improve the organizational culture?

Employee assessments and leadership assessments are equally important in gathering insights for building a healthy team dynamic and an engaging and productive workplace. Employee assessments today must address topics that affect both the individual and the team, the micro and the macro, the results and the means by which they are achieved.

Primalogik’s Employee Performance Review Software makes employee reviews easier

By focusing your performance reviews on these key topics, you’ll encourage employees’ growth and help them advance to the next level. And your employees will learn to view these conversations as a chance to gain valuable feedback and support. 

Primalogik is a leading provider of employee performance management software. Our online employee performance review tool features all the right functions to create and perform effective reviews. From personalized questions to embedded goal-tracking, this professional human resources software delivers. Try a free demo today!