Are you thinking of changing your reward system?
Companies today may spend valuable time and resources designing and implementing new incentive schemes and performance management systems, but often fail to put plans in place to ensure the change positively impacts their most important assets – their people.
No matter how well researched and thought out your design may be, the change initiative will not deliver the desired benefits if the change is not managed proactively. The Change Management and Communications strategy is one of the most important aspects of any transition, but is, ironically, often underestimated.
When designing and implementing a reward scheme and performance management process, there are 4 critical steps to embedding the change and achieving true organisational transformation.
- Leadership Alignment
When designing a new incentive scheme, it is critical to ensure that the leadership team is aligned around the kinds of behaviours they want their employees to display. It may seem as though it would be obvious, but consider taking some time out to workshop what your company’s strategic intent is, and what values and behaviours will drive the achievement of your strategic goals. In any change initiative, it is the leadership team that will determine whether the change is successfully embedded or not through their ownership and visible commitment to the change. That is why leadership alignment is the first critical step in the change journey.
- Engaging Employees
To successfully embed change, it is essential to touch the hearts and the minds of your people. When designing a new incentive scheme, it is important to engage your employees to find out what motivates them and what they value most in the way of remuneration. There is no one-size-fits-all solution. For the first time in history, we have 4 generations working together. Different employees at various stages of their lives will value vastly different incentives and benefits. Make sure that your incentive scheme talks to your employees and motivates them to perform. When implementing the new reward scheme and performance management system, the job of securing employees’ buy-in will be half done, as staff will likely welcome the change because it speaks to what they motivates them personally.
- Employee Alignment
Providing clarity and alignment around what is expected of employees in order for them to succeed is just as important as engaging with them around the design of the incentive scheme. Unfortunately, many companies fail to include a Change Management programme in their implementation plans. There is no communication campaign and therefore certainly no buy-in from staff. Speaking from past experience, employees are often not even aware of what their KPIs or targets are, or what success will look like. It is vitally important to make your incentive scheme and performance management process as clear and transparent as possible.
- Capability Development
The last critical step when implementing a new reward scheme and performance management system is to ensure that your people are equipped to be successful in their roles. Whether it be providing technical skills training or mentoring, do you have a structure in place that ensures your people are continuously growing in your organisation, and do your line managers possess the necessary skill and training to effectively coach, mentor and develop your staff?
Our Change Management experts at Mindcor Consulting are able to help you transition individuals, teams, and business units to your desired future state, while making sure your people still have the energy to get their work done. We specialise in all kinds of transformational change, including new reward and performance management initiatives, organisation design implementations, as well as new technology implementations. We’ll work together to create a high-performance culture that attracts and retains talented employees by creating a true sense of belonging. Through a holistic approach, there is effective Change Management in the adoption and assimilation of the change into the organisational culture.
Written by: Cathy Broeders
Principal Consultant at Mindcor Executive Search and Consulting