Wednesday, August 7, 2013

Is Performance Evaluation Training and Consulting a New Gateway to EAP Consulting

Think about performance reviews and performance evaluations of employees. If your experience has been anything like mine, you know that supervisors not only dislike conducting performance evaluations for a host of reasons, but many supervisors renege on their responsibilities and don't do them at all. When I worked for Arlington County government, I discovered many supervisors hadn't done performance evaluations with employees in years. Where was HR? Ignoring these supervisors of course. The risk associated with lack of performance evaluation is enormous, and there is one overwhelming reason why. It's this: The supervisor has only his or her relationship as a tool to managed the employee performance, conduct, and other behavior. A bad relationship can turn into violence and other problems--like theft and conflicts--but the worst of all is violence in the workplace. Stay tuned. We are going to be display a new program and course on conducting effective performance evaluations. I believe there exists an enormous opportunity to propel the EAP field forward, and that is by claiming the high ground on this unmet need to train supervisors. Get ready for the Performance Evaluation Training Program. I will post a link so you can view it soon.

Tuesday, August 6, 2013

EAP Newsletters: Pipelines for Higher EAP Utilization

The workplace wellness newsletter is still under-appreciated for its value in reducing human and financial losses in the workplace. I think most companies separate wellness newsletter topics away from other education and training that reduces human behavioral risk in the workplace, and this a mistake. It's why I encourage using some newsletter device that combines all behavioral risk reduction content in one source document. I am beginning to think that reducing employee behavioral risk and exposures is better served by small pieces of ongoing, easily digested information, ongoing awareness information, and training in addition to whatever one-shot training topics are offered or mandated by the company. I agree with the wellness newsletter premise that it is a tool to support management first and employees second. This does not make it incompatible with helping or even entertaining employees. However, anything that a business organization institutes should be to its benefit or it is by definition or it is not in conformance with mission and goals of the organization and therefore is improper. The goal of a employee wellness newsletter should be in my opinion--a conduit for education, information, training, awareness to positively influence employees to practice better behaviors that reduce risk, enhances organizational productivity, and improves their personal well-being.