The Loop Summer 2016 Web

EFFECTIVE HR PRACTICES
JUST BECAUSE WORKING WITH
LITTLE PEOPLE IS YOUR BUSINESS,
DOESN’T MEAN WORKING
WITH YOUR PEOPLE IS EASY
I remember entering one of my first
management roles with the gusto I
thought was required to energise a team
and motivate them to do great work.
I had worked in the sector for more
than 10 years, I knew what the work
involved and what it meant to do it well.
I had supervised trainees and had been
told by colleagues that I inspired them –
wasn’t that enough?
Apparently it wasn’t.
Within the first month it became obvious that three
of the team had significant performance issues. As
I would later find out, they were performance and
behaviour issues that two managers before me had
failed to address. Issues that overtime compounded
to the point where there was a pattern of the service
losing a lot of really great staff, but these three staff
remained. There were no notes of what had been
done to address the concerns, just gossip. There was
no clear HR procedures and policies in place to guide
what needed to be done, just dusty policies that had
no real application to what I faced. There was no
wise experienced boss to guide and support, just
unprepared, unskilled little ‘ol me.
Transition
Development
Recruitment
EMPLOYEE
LIFE CYCLE
Performance
Selection
Succession
6
IN THE LOOP