Employee Performance Review for Remote Employees

by Srikant Chellappa Mar 10,2022
Engagedly
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with Srikant Chellappa, CEO

The thought of employee performance review and evaluation is often very painful for most employees. The process is tedious, complex and time-consuming in most cases, especially for remote workers. But, it does not necessarily need to be so.

The most important factor of a performance review is the performance analysis of an employee. If that is done right, the data can be used to improve employee output as well as in other decision-making processes. Things get slightly more complex when the employees are working remotely. While some traditional in-office methods can be used to evaluate remote employees, it’s best to streamline the process according to the situation.

Here are some tips to improve your employee performance review process for remote employees:

It’s the output that matters

If an employee is professionally dressed, comes in on time, pours over his or her system throughout the day, is that enough signs to show that he or she is working efficiently? How does that help when it comes to evaluating remote employees?

You can act like an obsessive boss and keep checking their login, logout details and the quantity of work, but does that really showcase productivity?

It does not. In all great companies, the focus is on the quality of work, the output, not the input. To be honest, in the current world affairs all businesses are focusing more on sustenance, not profit. So don’t push your employees to produce enormous work that does not really add value to the organization. Give them the peace of mind and the liberty to give in their best and produce great work. This is what will keep the company afloat through the COVID-19 crisis. It’s not the other way round.

Also read: Is Lack Of Employee Recognition Damaging To The Company?

Gather 360-degree feedback

An employee does not just work with their direct manager, they work with team members, other teams and departments, other managers and supervisors among others. So when you are evaluating remote employee performance, make sure you gather feedback from everyone else who is associated with them. That way you don’t have to rely only on your evaluation but gather more insight about their performance, their style of work, their coordination skills, and where their talent and skills can be best utilized. This is a great way to accurately review your remote employees’ performance.

Get them to Self-evaluate

A Harvard Business Review article says that an employee can be susceptible to two different traps when it comes to self-evaluation. One of them is, they tend to get overconfident (termed as the Overconfidence Effect) and set higher bars than they can possibly achieve. The second one is, they attribute their successes to talent and skill, overlooking the other environmental factors (termed as Fundamental Attribution Error).

So when you get your remote employees to review themselves, you can then compare what other employees think of them, how they see themselves and then compare those data to how you as their manager see them. That gives a wholesome view of each employee.  Moreover, the employees also feel that their own perspectives matter. So giving them a chance to evaluate their own performance can also lead to employee engagement and drive them to access themselves better.

Provide valuable feedback consistently

Most employees are used to working in an office environment where they interact well and receive regular feedback. So when these employees start working from home, they might feel anxious in the face of prolonged silence and may start thinking up negative scenarios. As a manager it is important for you to keep providing them feedback often, and document it. That way they won’t feel disconnected from the work environment and would continue to perform stably. And you will be able to follow the pattern of their performances.

Also read: Why You Need A Real Time Performance Management Software

Have a sense of trust

It’s not easy to trust employees, even when you are working with them in an office environment, let alone when they are working remotely. But in the given situation, it’s something you would need to practice. Even if you are not able to see them in action, you need to trust them, unless you have evidence of them not working.

Evaluating remote employee performance efficiently is a significant element of consideration in the coming quarter. Given the world scenario, it’s important to get it right and make sure that your company and your people, both benefit from your employee performance review process.


Want to know how Engagedly can help you implement seamless performance reviews for your remote employees?

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Author
Srikant Chellappa
CEO & Co-Founder of Engagedly

Srikant Chellappa is the Co-Founder and CEO at Engagedly and is a passionate entrepreneur and people leader. He is an author, producer/director of 6 feature films, a music album with his band Manchester Underground, and is the host of The People Strategy Leaders Podcast. He is currently working on his next book, Ikigai at the Workplace, which is slated for release in the fall of 2024.

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