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Performance

For a company, the reason for working is to produce value. So, we can measure the performance of individual employees and the company's overall performance.

For overall performance, Issor Zineb concludes that:

In short, performance is a complex, multi-dimensional concept that integrates different dimensions to define it and measurement indicators because it remains a matter of perception. Not all players have the same perception of performance. It is relative to the company's vision, strategy, and objectives. In this sense, a company's performance can be measured from several angles and is not limited solely to its financial dimension. To assess it, it is necessary to measure all its dimensions and rely on its determining factors to improve it.1

We are facing the issue of nations being increasingly limited by relying solely on gross domestic product (GDP) as a measure of success.

Individual performance is a separate matter. Historically, performance was primarily measured through tangible outputs such as garments, objects, paintings, or cars. However, with the shift of industries to Asian countries, a significant portion of European workers now engage in the tertiary sector, focusing on producing and maintaining services.

Given these circumstances, the definition of performance had to evolve. It could no longer be solely based on productivity. Instead, it required evaluating the often complex and challenging-to-measure informal work. Identifying strengths and weaknesses in this context became a significant challenge for managers who relied solely on mechanical performance evaluation models.

Is work assessment a matter of judging the result of work or measuring it? To judge is to form an opinion, a point of view, an opinion, an idea, or an appreciation of the result of a job. To measure is to determine the value of certain quantities by comparison with a constant quantity of the same kind taken as a standard or unit. Since we don't know how to measure work, we must judge it.2

To evaluate work, it is important to understand what it entails. However, no one can claim enough knowledge to judge it in a constantly changing system except for the consulting agency driving the change!

Both of these concepts of corporate performance have a significant impact on employee motivation.

If a company solely focuses on profit and demonstrates this through the dividends it distributes to shareholders, there is a high likelihood that employee commitment will suffer.

Suppose individual performance is assessed solely based on production results without considering the broader context of the work. In that case, employees will inevitably resort to strategies of hiding and deceiving to meet Key Performance Indicators (KPIs).

However, individual performance has primarily centered around productivity, with little attention given to defining its content.

To evaluate performance, it is necessary to assess both the efforts made and the influences of the environment. This environment is increasingly characterized by volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity (VUCA)3, whether economic, social, or political.

In the '90s, Campbell proposed an 8-dimensional definition of performance:

  1. Job-specific task skills
  2. Competence in non-job-specific tasks
  3. Written and oral communication
  4. Work effort
  5. Maintaining self-discipline
  6. Facilitating team and colleague performance
  7. Supervising
  8. Managing and administering

This was a first step towards understanding the reality of work as an activity under influence and constraints other than those implicit in it.

In 2003, Motowidlo took the subject further, considering that performance results from activities and cannot be reduced to a job description.

Work performance is defined as the total value expected by the organization from the episodes of discrete behaviors performed by an individual over a given period 4

This definition has the advantage of taking the view that performance is primarily concerned with the individual's effort (labor) and not just with the result produced.

Indeed, if we equate performance solely with the individual's results, we run the risk of ignoring the contextual factors that help or hinder the individual in carrying out his or her work (availability and quality of equipment, strategic and operational decisions beyond the individual's control, market situation, etc.)5

For an individual, performance can be divided into two categories:

  1. Task performance: This category includes all work activities that are traditionally described in job and skill classifications or benchmarks.
  2. Contextual performance: This category evaluates the individual in terms of behaviors that contribute to organizational efficiency through their effects on the psychological, social, and organizational context of work.

In 2003, Mitchell and Daniels proposed a general model of work motivation that leads to performance6. They identified the factors that interact with motivation in achieving performance:

  • The physical environment in which work is performed.
  • The definition or design of tasks in the job can lead to problems of role conflict and ambiguity.
  • The rewards and reinforcement systems.
  • The social norms prevail in the work team, organization, and organizational culture.

Based on these considerations, I propose a definition of performance, or rather, a symbolic formula that represents the ingredients of performance:

First, there are skills. These skills naturally affect task performance and also have a major impact on motivation.

$$ Performance = \frac{Competencies * Mobilization * Context^{internal}_{external}}{Reference Value} $$

  1. Mobilization, which we will discuss in more detail later, represents putting motivation into action.
  2. Context refers to the set of events, behaviors, advantages, and complications that influence the quality of the work result. It originates from two sources:
    1. The company's internal context, such as the work atmosphere and equipment quality.
    2. The external context, including competition, political context, and private life.
  3. The reference value is the standard against which performance can be compared or judged. It typically includes quantity, quality, and lead time. However, it can also be derived from a previous similar experience.

Studies on performance as a multidimensional result, considering both the individual and their environment, are relatively recent. However, they primarily apply to the individual themselves.

Studies on team performance are much rarer, and none integrate all available data. There are still many areas of investigation to be explored to define the factors that influence team performance.

Nevertheless, there is a tendency to highlight the impact of routinization within teams on their performance.

These routines are established at three complementary levels7:

  • Behavioral routines increase execution speed.
  • Cognitive routines facilitate quick action in familiar situations.
  • Social routines promote interaction among team members.

However, routinization can also have negative effects when countermeasures are not in place, such as:

  • Normalization
  • Social laziness
  • Submission to authority

An alternative approach to improving group performance focuses on the organization and interpersonal structure within the group.

For small groups, a mesh topology is found to be more effective. This allows each person to exchange information directly through a direct link.

However, as the group grows larger, it becomes more efficient to consider a node topology (nodal) or SPOC (Single Point Of Contact) to simplify information gathering.

This structural approach to team organization has a significant impact not only on productivity but also on a company's communication, creativity, and innovation.

This idea was proposed by Melvin Conway as early as 1967:

"Organizations that design systems [...] inevitably produce designs that are copies of their organization's communication structure." 8

There is no comprehensive, scientific model of group and team performance in the business world.

A common mistake is to look to the world of sports, where many coaches offer visions that can be applied to the corporate world. The military and paramilitary world also provides a vision for optimizing team strengths.

However, these models apply to production contexts that have little to do with the reality of the corporate world. Employees are unlikely to encounter adversaries, rival teams, or enemies during their work. And even if tensions exist within a department, confrontational methods are unlikely to ease them.

Competition in the workplace is limited in time and space, with well-defined teammates and strict rules. In contrast, in the world of work, the duration of tasks is often unknown, and the rules are flexible. They can be circumvented or adapted; the teammates are changeable and not always easily identified.

Tan Daoqi's Thirty-Six Stratagems or Sun Wu's Art of War are not suitable references for a corporate motivation strategy.

However, what unites these three contexts (business, sport, and war) is a challenge, which acts as a strong dopamine stimulus that strengthens participant bonds. In this regard, adversity can indeed have a revealing effect on the cohesion and team spirit of a workgroup.

Nevertheless, extreme experiences like these must be approached with intelligence. Placing a team in an emergency solely to increase cohesion, as is sometimes done in team-building exercises, can create an adverse reaction from specific individuals whose temperament is not suited for high stress and social tension.

It is important to remember that athletes choose to compete, just as soldiers accept the idea of war. However, an employee has not embarked on a journey of struggle and combat by default. It is a serious management error to believe that this ability is inherent to every profession.