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Reignite Business Performance for Competitive Edge – From Vision to Reality: Performance Management
17 February 2011:
Welcome to part three of a four-part series of articles based on an Executive Briefing entitled ‘Reignite Business Performance for Competitive Edge – From Vision to Reality’. The articles in this series capture insights provided by CorporateLeaders and Raytheon Professional Services, keynote speaker Blandine Kouyaté, Head of HR EMEA, Yahoo! and invited guests of the Executive Briefing.
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Performance Management
In order for any business to successfully enact a strategy, it must see to it that performance is optimized across the company and is aligned to achieve the targets outlined in the strategy.
On a micro-level, performance management plays a critical role, as the goals established for individual employees need to be both aligned with corporate objects and measured to ensure peak performance.
But the question raised by some participants at the Executive Briefing was the following: “At what point does traditional performance management hinder creativity and innovation?”
The Yahoo! Case
Blandine Kouyaté, Head of HR EMEA*
“Within Yahoo! we make great use of performance scorecards. So much so, that in the end, the fundamentals within the scorecard that define high performance and high achievement become the baseline for our day-to-day reality,” explains Blandine Kouyaté, Head of HR EMEA, Yahoo!. “We started out in 1994 as a small unconventional company, but today we must manage the activities of thousands of people around the globe. The very informal processes that existed when the Yahoo! team worked together in one room cannot be duplicated because the makeup and therefore the dynamics of our company have changed.”
Yahoo! relies on balanced scorecards to help measure behaviour. They are not only useful for revealing what someone is good at, but they also help to illuminate what has been done to reach an achievement. So for example, an employee achieves target X. Yahoo!’s scorecard also seeks to reveal how it was achieved. How much time was spent? Did they communicate their progress regularly and clearly to appropriate stakeholders?
Thanks to Yahoo!’s qualitative and quantitative scorecard approach the company has noted:
- Increased participation across the company
- That the data provided can help drive the focus of leaders
- That HR-leaders are able to develop action plans co-owned by employees and the business
- That goals are better aligned
- That there’s an increased appetite and confidence for managing performance
“So yes, as Yahoo has grown, we’ve become more formal. But the issue for any company is to find the right balance. We make sure we build the right foundations by including people from all areas of the company in the development of our performance management assessments,” says Kouyaté.
Dissatisfaction with management is one of the Top 10 reasons for leaving a company
Effective managers can increase :
- Discretionary effort by 29%,
- Commitment by 49%,
- Individual performance by 29%
- Perceived match with job 66%
Corporate Leadership Council, Employee Engagement Data
*Blandine Kouyaté joined Yahoo! in 2002 as HR Manager, France, then gained responsibility for the HR department in Southern Europe in 2006. Throughout that period, she focussed on integrating several businesses with significant employee populations, while implementing a scalable HR function and supporting cultural transformation within the region.
In 2008, Kouyaté partnered with the VP Sales Europe as an HR Director. In this role, she drove HR strategies aligned with both the business needs and talent aspirations of the unit. In 2010, her scope was extended to support additional regional units (Partnerships, Audience and Marketplaces).
Since June 2010, Kouyaté has been acting as the interim Head of HR for Yahoo! in charge of the EMEA HR function, including 25 direct team members who support a population of over 1700 employees based in 19 countries.
