Reference no: EM133095977

Case study: 

Mr. Lee is the District Sales Manager for RealFit, a supplier of equipment to the fitness and health centre industry. The business has been developing its market share over the past several years, based on exceptional customer service, innovative and leading-edge equipment, and a commitment to safety. In the coming five years, the company aims to increase its market share by 5% each year. The company is also aiming for a profit increase of 20% in the next five years, based on a combination of cost efficiency and increased sales, both from repeat sales, referrals, and new customers. It also aims to break into the private sales market and supply fitness equipment for home use, something that it is currently not doing. The company has recognised a trend for busy professionals to tend to buy more fitness equipment for home use to save time by not having to go to a gym or health club. Therefore, the company will need to restructure its operations to accommodate this new market, sales reps will be required to attend shopping centre displays and information counters, as well as deal with customers directly who need in-home information and assistance.

Mr. Lee enjoys playing an important part in building the company's client base through the activities of a team of 15 sales representatives who are responsible for servicing the needs of both regional and metropolitan customers. Mr. Lee is due to deliver a presentation that afternoon at a conference that has been organised for fitness centre managers from various states. 

Mr. Lee was relieved to hear from Janah, one of the sales representatives, before he headed off to the conference. The sales representatives are required to report in each Friday afternoon to bring Mr. Lee up to date with their activities for the week. There has been more than one occasion where Janah has not made her weekly report. Happily, on this occasion, Janah informs Mr. Lee that she has met with a range of clients and is close to meeting her sales quota for the week. Her final appointment for the day is at a suburban fitness centre, so she will not be returning to the office at the end of the day. 

There has been a range of performance problems with Janah over the past several months that he has chosen to ignore, but there had been several complaints from other team members about Janah's performance. Mr. Lee decides he will develop a plan to deal with Jannah's performance problems over the weekend. On joining RealFit six months ago, Mr. Lee was given responsibility for developing a new performance management system. He had delayed doing this until he felt that he had a solid understanding of the organisation's culture and operations. 

Mr. Lee believes that it would be most effective if he evaluates and revises the performance management system, and then implement it whilst dealing with Janah's performance problems. 

Sales representatives were paid a salary plus commission. What Mr. Lee learned when he started in the position, was that all the sales representatives earned the maximum commission because the fitness industry had been expanding over recent years and business had been booming. Janah's performance problems have proved difficult to address as the nature of the sales representative's job renders direct observation by their manager virtually impossible. Mr. Lee is aware that on several occasions Janah has missed appointments with customers, has twice missed deadlines on preparing quotes and on three occasions included incorrect figures while preparing quotes for customers. Mr. Lee has also overheard conversations between other members of the team that makes him think that Janah may not be a good team player. She does not share sales leads and does not pass on customer referrals. Mr. Lee noticed that there was some joking by team members that Janah shouldn't be invited to the team annual sales awards night as she was not really part of the team. 

Finally, Mr. Lee had noticed that within the last three months he had become victim of job enlargement on Janah's account. Janah has a reputation for not correctly completing the paperwork associated with customer orders. Mr. Lee has developed the habit of revising Janah's incomplete paperwork in order to ensure that customers are not inconvenienced, or sales cancelled.

Refer to the case study about RealFit found in this assessment document under Assessment 1. Your task is to develop an individual learning and development plan for Janah, an employee of RealFit whose performance is unsatisfactory. You are required to identify specific issues and gaps in her performance, and develop appropriate actions and opportunities for learning, support and training to assist the employee in achieving the required performance standard.

Questions:

1. Discuss how you will report on Janah's progress:
   1. What information will you include in the report and who will you report to? 
   2. How will you provide Janah with feedback at appropriate stages?

2. Describe how you will keep performance session notes and interventions, performance plans, meeting outcomes and reports about Janah's progress accessible but securely stored to prevent unauthorised access.