Reference no: EM132343350

Manage People Performance Assignment -

Assessment Task 1: Project

Instructions to the student - The Conference - For the purpose of this activity you are to imagine you are working in a management role with 10 direct reports in a large organisation.

Your organisation is to play host to a one-day national conference on Performance Management Systems and Concepts in Australia. The HR Manager has asked for a team to volunteer to take on the task of organising and managing the conference.

The target audience for the conference are operational managers, supervisors, frontline managers, team leaders and middle management across all states. It is anticipated that up to 600 delegates will attend.

The conference is scheduled for two months' time. The HR Manager has organised guest speakers and determined the day's agenda as follows. The conference venue has been booked at the deposit paid, but no catering or other entertainment has been organised.

Conference Agenda -

9am Welcome and Overview

The Chief Executive of Host organisation (ie, your CEO)

9.30 am The Keys to Optimal Performance

Kris Cole - Australia's best-selling business author and Industrial psychologist

10.30am Morning Tea

11am The SunRise Experience - Systems that Support

Jerri Harding - National Human Resources Manager, SunRise Corporation

12pm The School of Hard Knocks and Doing It MY way

Nadine Christous - Ex Chief Commissioner of Victoria Police

1pm Lunch

2pm Case Studies

Barnaby hospital

Marakua City Council

Fitzsimmons IT Solutions

3pm Afternoon Tea

3.30pm Panel Discussion

Kris Cole, Jerri Harding and Christine Nixon as the panel

Questions from delegates

4.30 Summary and Conclusions

CEO of Host Organisation

5pm Finish

5.30 Drinks and finger food

a) You would like to volunteer your team for this task. What would you need to consider before doing this?

b) How would you ensure you have consulted with your team effectively and identified the necessary resources required?

c) Develop a work plan/action plan for your team for this task, and describe briefly how you would do this. You can create this plan as you choose however you should consider the following points when developing this:

• What needs to be done
• Objectives and KPI's for the project
• Key stakeholders
• Ground rules/code of conduct
• Risk analysis and contingency
• Tasks to be completed by whom and when (you can allocate tasks to any of your ten direct

d) What are your responsibilities as the leader when distributing work amongst your team?

e) Which policies and procedures and other processes (including relevant awards and certified agreements) may you need to refer to when working with your team? Could include use the enterprise agreement/award to be clear about.

f) How would you go about developing and confirming performance indicators before you start the job? Who would you need to involve in this process?

g) Conduct a risk analysis of the above task in accordance with legal requirements. What strategies will you implement in order to mitigate the identified risks?

h) What strategies would you use to provide informal feedback to your team?

i) Describe the steps and corrective actions you would take if you identified a team member who was performing poorly. How would you document this?

j) What would you do if this team member continued to show poor performance? Who may need to be advised regarding this?

k) What would you do if you had to terminate this team member?

l) Why might you provide on-the-job coaching?

Assessment Task 2: Case studies

Instructions to the student - In this task you are to respond to the questions related to each of the following case studies. Each case study revolves around an employee who is demonstrating poor performance.

Case study 1 - Ryan manages a team of 5 staff in a small office environment. Sophie is a relatively new staff member to the team having recently taken on the position of trainee receptionist. Initially Sophie's performance was great and Ryan was pleased with her ability to quickly learn new tasks and work well as part of a team.

Recently however Ryan has noticed that Sophie's performance has begun to deteriorate. She is consistently late without explanation, takes personal calls regularly throughout the day and is not meeting deadlines that have been set. Ryan has also found that her attitude and communication techniques when dealing with clients has not been appropriate and require improvement in order for her to continue in the role.

a) Using the performance improvement plan in Appendix 1, develop a plan for Sophie's improvement ensuring you have included areas required for improvement and set clear indicators for review.

b) How would Ryan need to work with Sophie to identify additional support that may be required including management support and resources?

c) What strategies should Ryan implement in order to ensure both he and Sophie are able to come to an agreement regarding the plan and are clear on the requirements of this?

d) In which circumstances may Ryan be required to seek assistance from human resources specialists when working with Sophie regarding this performance improvement plan?

e) In which circumstances might Ryan need to direct Sophie to relevant support services?

Case study 2 - Peter has been with the organisation for about six months, and has been an enthusiastic and quick learner. He started off in another department and then moved to your team four weeks ago.

Peter hasn't quite settled down with the other members of the team yet - he has been reluctant to contribute and is 'stand- offish' with others in the team. You've overheard one of the guys complaining that that they think Peter is 'stuck up'. You have also noticed that Peter tends to do his own thing rather than cooperate with team members.

The types of material your team produces is almost always a team effort - at the very least, two or three of the team have input in all communications. Certainly nobody sends off a paper, memo or communication without having at least run it past a few others in the team.

For example, twice Peter has completed a piece of work without any consultation with any of the team. On these occasions, Peter sent out minutes of a meeting that included some decisions made at the meeting - and the way Peter has written them up has led to misinterpretation. Peter has detailed the conversations that took place at the meetings - not just the outcomes of the discussions - and there has been some backlash from some more senior people who were at the meetings, who have complained,'that's not what we said at all!'

You have decided to have a chat with Peter - you would like him to fit into the team, and you feel you need to give some feedback. You also need to talk to him about your team's way of working and deal with the issues that have occurred so far.

Write a feedback message for Peter that demonstrates the characteristics of good feedback.

Case study 3 - David manages a team of 10 customer service consultants for a large metropolitan centre. Six team members work full time over two shifts, and the remaining four work between .25 to .5 full time equivalent (FTE). Because of these different time fractions, it is important that everyone arrives on time for their shift to make sure there is adequate service coverage across the working day.

For the past six months, one full-time staff member, Sarah, has been late on a regular basis, missing the start of the early shift at least once a week. Sarah has taken five days un-certificated sick leave, and on two of those occasions did not call to call in to explain her absence. Sarah's work performance has also deteriorated - she is taking longer breaks, is often away from her workstation and nobody knows where she is. She has also become withdrawn with her colleagues. One of the team members has complained to David about Sarah's 'slackness'.

David has verbal exchanges with Sarah on a number of occasions and, despite Sarah's assurances that she will 'lift her game', nothing has changed. This week David met with his own manager, who wanted to know why there was a drop in customer satisfaction ratings. After explaining his situation, David was advised to seek the help of the Human Resources department in resolving the matter.

David is feeling very frustrated about the situation and believes he has done everything reasonable to address Sarah's under performance. He asks HR if they can terminate Sarah's employment.

a) What do you think HR will say about David's suggestion to terminate employment?

b) How does Fair Work Australia define unfair dismissal?

c) What would HR advise David to do regarding Sarah's underperformance?

d) If Sarah's performance doesn't improve, explain what David needs to do next?

Assessment Task 3: Short answer questions

Instructions to the student - This open book task will be completed during class time. You can use the Internet, books, magazines and other resources supplied by your trainer/assessor to help you with your answers.

Complete the questions below. You are required to answer all questions correctly. If incorrect answers are provided, your assessor will identify if there are gaps in your knowledge and understanding and will work with you to make arrangements for reassessment.

Question 1 - How would you describe excellent performance demonstrated by your staff?

Question 2 - How would you recognise or reward this excellence?

Question 3 - Describe how you would monitor and coach colleagues who demonstrate poor performance.

Question 4 - What type of support services could you recommend to a staff member who feels they need some assistance?

Question 5 - A new member of staff has commenced employment. Create a session plan for a short training session for the employee on the performance management and review process in an organisation. You can source a process from any relevant organisation you are interested in.

Question 6 - Why is it important for performance management and review processes to be consistent with organisational objectives and policies and operational plans?

Question 7 - Describe some ways in which staff can obtain information about development options.

Question 8 - When allocating work to staff how would you ensure you are doing so in a way that is efficient, cost effective and outcome focused?

Question 9 - Why is it important to confirm your performance expectations with relevant teams and staff?

Question 10 - Refer to the performance management policy for James Cook University as provided to you by your assessor and answer the following questions regarding this.

a) Throughout a 12 month review cycle how often will interim feedback/planning/development discussions occur prior to the formal review?

b) How much notice must employees be provided to plan for PMP discussion?

c) What information is to be documented at the first review?

d) Whose responsibility is it to maintain a record of interim feedback/planning/development discussions?

e) Who is required to sign off on completed reports regarding PMP?

f) Where are the records relating to PMP kept for:

i) A probationary employee

ii) All other employees

Question 11 - Referring to the below areas, advise why it is important to adhere to the legislation regarding this when managing staff:

Occupational Health and Safety & environmental issues

Equal Opportunity & Anti-Discrimination

Industrial relations

Question 12 - Using the Fair Work Australia website relating to awards research an industry award of an industry you may be interested in working in.

What does your chosen award state in regards to:

Hours of Work:

Breaks:

Overtime and penalty rates:

Question 13 - Why is it important to provide informal feedback to staff and monitor their performance regularly?

Question 14 - Why is it important to refer to your organisations risk management policy when managing staff or implementing a performance management plans?