How Cezanne HR supports effective performance management programmes

When we speak to HR professionals about their day-to-day challenges, managing effective performance management programmes is an ever-popular topic.

That’s especially true when the companies they work for have outgrown their start-up roots, have enjoyed quick and rapid growth, or have employees based in multiple locations.

It’s often the case that their performance management processes were entirely adequate when they had a small workforce: perhaps relying on spreadsheets, paper forms, standalone systems or ad-hoc evaluation activities. But, this reliance on disjointed, manual processes or a ‘that’ll do’ attitude to employee performance has become unsustainable as their business and its workforce has expanded.

As a result, they’ll now be facing more serious problems which are preventing them from successfully managing employee performance, including:

• Overwhelming amounts of administration leading to reporting errors
• Employees being unclear as to what is being expected of them, and how they’re being evaluated
• Some employees having regular appraisals whilst others have hardly any, or none at all!
• Regular check-ins being missed
• Comments or feedback not being accurately collected or acted upon
• A lack of meaningful data to support HR and manager decision making.

Those issues aren’t just troublesome for HR teams. For employees, an ineffectual – or non-existent – performance management programme can be hugely demotivating, too. For example, a Gallup poll revealed that only a miserly 14% of employees strongly agreed their performance reviews had inspired them to improve their workplace performance.

Where Cezanne HR’s performance management software comes in

The simple fact of the matter is this: when a business doesn’t have the means to measure and evaluate the performance of their workforce, it’s highly unlikely they’ll be operating as efficiently or profitably as they could.

Luckily, Cezanne HR’s integrated performance management software can help eliminate the common issues we mentioned earlier, making performance management simpler and more effective for everyone. Here’s how…

Everything you need, all in one place

When you have all your important HR data in one place, managing an employee performance programme becomes considerably simpler. For instance, Cezanne HR performance software automatically pulls through employee data from the core People Management module, including their reporting relationships. This means you only need to define your employee data once.

That kind of time-saving functionality means you will never have to worry about common HR mistakes, such as data duplications, accidentally missing employees out because they’ve only recently joined, or broken reporting relationships when managers change roles. The existing employee record within the People Management module is simply enhanced with the appropriate performance data as reviews, check ins, goals etc. are added. Easy!

Intelligent automation and transparency

As an HR professional, you’ll probably know that sending out and chasing up performance appraisal forms can be a laborious undertaking. It takes up valuable time and, since the data can be hard to organise, rarely delivers the key insights HR – or indeed the wider business – can benefit from.

The Cezanne HR Performance module automates the flow of forms to the right people in the correct order. This makes gathering all the information in human resources management systems much simpler. It also frees up HR’s own time, provides vital information and promotes a focus on achieving performance objectives.

It isn’t just HR that Cezanne HR software can positively impact, though. For example, with the Performance module, employees receive automated email notifications when appraisal cycles have started, specific tasks are due, and their own goals are updated. This means everyone knows what’s been agreed, what’s expected of them, when they need to do it, and how they’re progressing against their own performance goals.

“The system has really had a positive effect on our appraisal process. It’s made the whole appraisal cycle more intuitive and straightforward. It automates the process of sending and tracking appraisal forms, it’s all done in the one place, and everyone can see everything involved in their own appraisal. It’s definitely solved an issue there!” – Charlotte Haynes, Operations Administrator for AgDevCo

Paperless processes for easier and secure administration

The Cezanne HR Performance module does away with the need for troublesome paper-based appraisal forms. So, no more rooting around in desks and filing cabinets to update an employee record, no more having to decipher difficult handwriting, and no more excess paper waste.

The Performance module allows users to directly complete review or appraisal forms online via the Cezanne HR self-service system. This saves time on writing up forms, chasing up employees to complete them, and ensures important employee information is safely secured and accessible only by the people who are authorised to see it.

“The Cezanne HR Performance Management module has been very important in saving time – we run all our performance management through Cezanne HR. By giving employees and line managers access to the data they need, and making approval processes easy to manage, we save a lot of time for HR and the business alike.” – PRMA Consulting

Editable forms designed to fit with your approach

Speaking of forms, Cezanne HR’s Performance Management software allows users to set up appraisal forms and review cycles that specifically fit your way of working, and support the outcomes you want. The online appraisal forms give you the opportunity to include:

• Reviewee guidance and comments
• SMART objectives
• Desired competencies and behaviours
• Open question fields
• Employer ratings
• Development and salary recommendations

Having all your performance forms online also ensures important documents don’t go missing, activities don’t get missed, information is accurately captured and everyone benefits from an easier and more satisfying experience.

Accurately capture 1-1 conversations

It isn’t just forms that the Cezanne HR Performance module accurately captures. The integrated module allows users to easily log conversations that take place in more informal 1-1s or catchups. As a result, anything discussed during those conversations can be easily recorded and validated by those who took part – aiding that all-important sense of transparency we mentioned earlier.

Real-time performance insights

Getting an instant, well-rounded picture of how an entire workforce is performing simply isn’t possible using manual processes or standalone systems. However, because Cezanne HR software modules bring all of your employee and performance data into one easy-to-use online platform, you’ll be able to gain real-time insights to your performance management programmes as they happen.

With the Performance module’s in-built process dashboard, you can see how well each performance review is progressing, check on participants, add or remove individual employees from specific reviews, trigger additional reminders to nudge activities along, or step into solve problems if you need to – all in the one place.

Unrivalled flexibility to fit your approach to performance management programmes

The best HR systems should complement and enhance existing processes – not just replace them. This is where the Cezanne HR Performance module can really make a difference for HR and line managers.

The Cezanne HR Performance module is highly configurable, meaning it can be fine-tuned to fit the user’s requirements – rather than having to build a performance management system from scratch. It enables a comprehensive approach to every aspect of managing workplace performance, such as supporting annual reviews and continuous performance management via frequent check-in conversations. The module also includes a goals section, to record goals and easily monitor progress.

“Flexibility was one of the reasons we originally opted for Cezanne HR, but it has proved to be even more flexible than we thought in terms of being able to adapt to the way the business works. The system is just making the whole performance management process much more uniform and efficient and is saving so much time.” Hayley McKenzie, Director of HR, Oxford Immunotec

Vital data to support smarter decision making

The in-built Performance dashboard gives users in-depth reporting abilities that are unrivalled by standalone systems. With all your employee and performance data in one place, you’ll benefit from comprehensive visibility over key performance information, such as competency ratings and progress against goals or objectives, through to training needs and salary recommendations.

Also, since agreed objective and development activities are recorded online via the Performance module and always available, participants are less likely to lose sight of what has been agreed. As a result, you’ll find it much easier to encourage a sustained focus on achieving performance objectives.

Superior self-service designed for growing and global businesses

Lastly, with Cezanne HR being a Cloud-based HR solution, the self-service functionality it offers users – both on desktop and mobile devices – means it’s perfect for businesses with a growing or global workforce.

The self-service functionality available through the integrated Performance module gives employees the freedom to review their profiles and update their own progress and evidence against goals. Plus, conversations with managers remain visible and any agreed actions are less likely to be forgotten or overlooked. But don’t just take our word for it: here’s what one of our customers had to say about their Cezanne HR experiences…

“Our self-service system before was extremely basic. It offered managers nothing special at all… They had absolutely no visibility of how their teams were progressing career-wise. This meant we [HR] had to spend huge amounts of time dealing with a lot of questions and time-consuming tasks.

Now, managers can access everything they could possibly need – it’s a huge step forward and the managers love it! The global capabilities of Cezanne HR meant we were able to solve a lot of the HR admin challenges that come with running an international business. You can’t imagine how much time that has saved us.” – Samantha Bedington, HR Business Partner at William Reed

When performance management programmes are essential for business success, why not see the Cezanne HR Performance module in action for yourself? To arrange a demo, just follow this link.