Performance Management
Performance management is a continuous process that promotes employee effectiveness. The managers, leaders, employees and the HR department work together to monitor the employees’ goals and their overall contribution to the firm. This means that performance management is aimed at linking the performance of employees to the organization’s objectives. One of the methods that organizations use to improve employee effectiveness in performance is deliberate practice. Deliberate practice involves motivating employees to improve their performance by providing them with well-defined tasks and following up with timely feedback. Another key aspect of deliberate practice is providing the employees with adequate opportunities for repetition for skill development. From this perspective, deliberate practice can be seen as an important intervention for performance improvement.
Deliberate Practice and Strategic Value
The deliberate practice process adds strategic value to an organization by sustaining employee and organizational performance. According to Macnamara, Hambrick, and Moreau (2016), deliberate practice focuses more on the quality of practice than the quantity. This is one of the reasons why it tends to be a better and reliable predictor of performance improvement in an organization. Ericsson and Moxley (2012) add that deliberate practice, due to its repetitive nature, acts as a motivation for individuals to attain professional goals. This is an important part of performance management because it integrates feedback, self-reflection, and learning that allow individuals to an opportunity to think about their expertise. The organization benefits from expertise development and adds on to the strategic value because it improves innovation among the employees.
Deliberate practice processes are meant to develop and sustain work-based expertise and knowledge for the benefit of the organization. An organization that cultivates a deliberate practice culture attains a competitive advantage because it acquires the capacity to improve, achieve targets, and focus on new possibilities. This means that deliberate practice develops competencies among individuals through effective training and development programs. This culture gives the organization an edge over other corporations by sustaining superior performance. Integrating deliberate practice processes with an organization’s objectives facilitates the improvement of operations and adds strategic value in the long term.
Prerequisites for the Implementation of a Deliberate Practice Process
The deliberate practice process requires the organization to perform a workplace skills plan to address the skill shortages in an organization. Therefore, one of the prerequisites of implementing the deliberate practice plan is conducting a self-assessment for the employees, identify focus strategies, and create measurable goals (Bromiley & Rau, 2014). The process must also allow for immediate feedback and reflection as the progress is tracked throughout the period of implementation. Therefore, an important prerequisite in the process of implementation is the indispensable performance metrics that track the progress of individual employees.
The Role of an HRM practitioner
An HRM practitioner has to ensure that the process is systematic and progressive. This ensures that the subskills build on each other to promote competent performance. The systematic approach ensures that the goals fit within the outlined skill progression. Even while making sure that these features are present, the HRM practitioner must also provide an enabling environment that motivates the employees. This is an intervention that provides the employees with opportunities to stretch their skills and align them with the organizational objectives (Eskreis-Winkler, Shulman, Young, Tsukayama, Brunwasser, & Duckworth, 2016).
Conclusion
Performance management is a collective process that involves managers and the employees. It is a process that can be attained through implementing the deliberate process that improves and promotes employee effectiveness. The deliberate process adds to the organization’s strategic value by improving performance and innovation. It is a process that gives organizations a competitive edge. Organizations should invest in the process to influence skill development and organizational performance.
References
Bromiley, P., & Rau, D. (2014). Towards a practice‐based view of strategy. Strategic Management Journal, 35(8), 1249-1256.
Ericsson, K. A., & Moxley, J. H. (2012). The expert performance approach and deliberate practice: Some potential implications for studying creative performance in organizations. Handbook of Organizational Creativity, Ed. Michael D. Mumford (Academic Press, Salt Lake City, 2012), 141-167.
Eskreis-Winkler, L., Shulman, E. P., Young, V., Tsukayama, E., Brunwasser, S. M., & Duckworth, A. L. (2016). Using wise interventions to motivate deliberate practice. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 111(5), 728.
Macnamara, B. N., Hambrick, D. Z., & Moreau, D. (2016). How Important Is Deliberate Practice? Reply to Ericsson (2016). Perspectives on Psychological Science, 11(3), 355-358.