Setting Expectations for Employees

As a manager how do you set expectations for results of your team?

If you obsess over the process of what they do, rather than what they do - it could give rise to a phenomenon which my ex-boss used to call "Operation successful, but the patient died"

Remember the middle name of KRA is "Results"

Focusing on what the result you expect at the end of the year is the best guidance you can give your team.

But you might say "Isn't the process as important as the result itself? I don't want people to break rules and achieve results. We are a "how and what" organization!"

To that the answer is - process needs to be communicated and adhered to separately, not via the KRA document.

Think about it - do you want every behavior you want people to comply with - and make a KRA list that's a length of a small novel - replete with "be a good manager" and "Be nice to customers" - or do you want to treat adults as - well- adults and let them make the choice of how to behave.

As a client shared recently - if you give people freedom to decide - there are chances that 2 out of 10 might misuse it - but that does not have to translate in making the other 8 suffer for it too.

Unfortunately most organizations end up making the majority pay for what the minority 'might do' - no wonder  most organizations are stifling bureaucratic places in which people look forward to weekends and despise Mondays.