Team performance in the workplace can be a tricky thing to navigate. At first glance, it may seem like teams naturally form according to the strengths of their members and the culture.
However, this is not always the case. Effective leaders can take targeted actions to improve team performance and facilitate sustainable transformations by using a performance management solution.
This is a system that helps leaders steer the direction of their team or organization. While every team performance tool is unique, they typically work by identifying strengths, areas for improvement, organizational trends and even team cultures. By measuring team performance and analyzing the data, leaders can gain valuable insights and create focused transformations.
Today’s performance management solutions are more than just workflow management tools—they’re backed by science and produce transparent and accurate data. This data, along with team assessments, can be used to develop strategic roadmaps, leading to tangible and real-world transformations within an organization.
If you’re looking to improve your team’s performance, a performance management solution may be just what you need. Read on to learn more about these solutions and the changes you can expect to see when implementing them in your company.
Before Implementing a Team Performance Management Solution
In order to understand the changes that occur when a team performance management solution is in play, it’s important to dissect how a team might be performing beforehand. When left to its own devices, a team’s performance becomes unpredictable. Here are some of the things teams might experience before implementing a performance management solution.
Lack of Clarity
Even though individuals in the workplace may have clear instructions for certain tasks, teams might still struggle with understanding various aspects of the organization if a team performance management system is not in place. This can lead to them not knowing their strengths and lacking direction on areas that require improvement.
Lack of Shared Purpose
Team performance management solutions help your team align around missions, goals and targets. That’s because, without group management, teams might be focused on their individual tasks and goals and not feel aligned with any shared purpose.
Lack of Adaptability
Effective team management is essential for teams to be prepared to handle change and possess adaptability skills. These skills enable teams to tackle the unexpected and transform as needs change.
Change is a common occurrence in the workplace, from the evolution of skill requirements to the emergence of new competitor brands. Teams that lack adaptability may be unprepared for unexpected events and may struggle to navigate through such situations.
Inconsistent Goals
Without a performance management solution, team members may have limited visibility into their goals and how their work contributes to the company’s broader objectives.
Lack of Resilience
Similarly to adaptability, teams that aren’t actively managing their performance will likely struggle with challenging scenarios. These can be internal team challenges or external conflicts (such as competitors, the economy or customers).
Limited Visibility
A team performance management solution gives leaders and team members a 360-degree view of their profiles, data, composition and more. Without these tools, teams are typically flying blind and lack vital visibility into their performance.
Low Employee Engagement
Teams that don’t utilize a performance management solution can experience low levels of employee engagement. Studies show this can lead to lower performance, poorer productivity, less profitability and higher absenteeism.
Siloing
Organizations can be riddled with silos, whether between teams or within one. Without a performance management solution, silos can lead to communication, alignment and collaboration breakdowns.
Lack of Leadership Development
When an organization is looking to develop leaders, it can be challenging to execute without the proper tools. Without insights from team performance management solutions, organizations won’t see critical data for leadership development, such as where strengths are and what communication styles are like.
Poor Communication
Speaking of communication, it can be challenging for teams to communicate without solid processes and platforms in place. For example, different personality types can dominate conversations, while quieter individuals might feel less inclined to communicate. And the cost of poor communication can be massive: research shows that poor communication can lead to decreased productivity, missed deadlines and negative financial impacts on the organization.
After Implementing a Team Performance Management Solution
Now that we’ve discussed what teams might look like before leveraging a team performance management solution, here are some transformations that might occur after one of these solutions is in play.
Improved Clarity and Direction
Teams that implement performance management solutions can experience improved clarity and direction, particularly regarding things such as opportunities and challenges. This leads to a clearer understanding of responsibilities, accountability and conflict resolution within the team.
Unification Around a Shared Purpose
A performance management solution can help a team center on a shared purpose, aligning with a company’s mission and vision.
Unwavering Adaptability
As technology and markets evolve rapidly, team performance management solutions can help leaders ensure their teams remain focused on what drives impact for their stakeholders and their organization.
Effective and Repeatable Goal Accomplishment
With team performance management, performance goals can be clearly identified, transparently shared and uniformly accomplished time and time again.
Strong Resiliency
When managed on performance, teams are far more likely to be resilient teams, which can engage with opportunity, persist through challenges and recover quickly from setbacks.
Full Visibility
Team performance management tools give both leaders and team members unparalleled insights into skills, composition and areas for improvement.
Better Employee Engagement
Employee engagement is driven by team dynamics, which can be fostered and cultivated with performance management tools. This can lead to teams with better trust, solid commitment and a shared drive to exceed their potential.
Cross-Functional Optimization
Instead of being stuck in silos, teams and team members led by performance management tools will have a blueprint for working better together.
Targeted Leadership Development
Providing revealing insights and data-backed takeaways can be a powerful tool for preparing leaders for success within organizations. By leveraging data and analytics, leaders can gain a deeper understanding of their strengths and weaknesses, as well as areas for improvement. This can help them make more informed decisions, prioritize tasks and lead their teams more effectively.
Excellent Communication
When team composition is well-understood, teams can take mindful steps to improve communication, clarify processes, navigate challenges and support other team members.
4 Teams RallyBright Has Helped Transform
Don’t take it from us: we have plenty of concrete examples of how team performance management tools have transformed particular teams. While we’re withholding specific organization names for privacy, here are some case studies on how RallyBright’s team performance management tools have impacted teams:
- RallyBright was leveraged by a four-person L&D team to support 60+ global executive teams to establish consistent support and measurement for leadership teams. The results included consistent team performance metrics and support globally, improved alignment, and support for executives.
- A new leader joined a leading global SaaS organization during a period of re-organization and before the economic downturn. The team was experiencing turnover and uncertainty due to disruption and turned to RallyBright. RallyBright rapidly diagnosed team alignment, strengths and opportunities and clarified direction and processes. This team hit 100% of its goals, with 0% voluntary attrition, and the leader demonstrated best practices that are now adopted throughout the organization.
- An executive team leveraged RallyBright’s tools to improve customer and employee satisfaction and retention. RallyBright’s insights on culture and performance led executives to guide and drive change in how leadership communicated, set goals and rewarded team members.
- A new product team leader received clarity and direction from RallyBright, on the opportunities and challenges the product team faced. The team leveraged RallyBright’s tools to better align their product development goals, providing a great opportunity for the leader to hit the ground running.
Over time, these tools have proven to be a game-changer for many teams.
There Are Nuances to Every Team, but a Team Performance Management Solution Will Leave Your Team Better Than Before
Every team is unique, but one thing is the same among all teams: a performance management tool can only lead to improvements. Data shows that organizations outperform their competition by 24% when they continuously manage team performance. Regardless of your industry or your team’s goals, team performance management tools can give leaders and decision-makers the insights, blueprints and strategies they need to help their team excel.
Interested in seeing how RallyBright’s tools can transform your team? We’re here to help your team take things to the next level, and our data-driven approach will give you the insights you need to make targeted, precise improvements.
Let us show you what we mean – try a RallyBright demo today.
