Lead by example
You need to show your employees that they are not the only ones who are being measured on their performance. When you maintain a scorecard, it shows that you’re holding yourself to the same standards.
“We have scorecards for president on down through the organization,” Volovar says. “One of mine would have to do with the administrative expenses. I have a goal for out of our dollars, how much we can spend on administrative expenses. On a monthly basis, that is tracked so that I and everyone else can see, how did we do as far as meeting our goal for the administrative expenses for the month?”
Volovar says she’s the first one to point out if she didn’t meet her goal or one of the other goals on her scorecard.
“I talk about what action steps we are taking to improve that,” Volovar says. “I get input from the team so that they can see nobody is perfect. You’re not always going to be 100 percent successful and that’s really OK. We learn by making mistakes. You have to lead by example. You have to be willing to stand up in front of the entire team and say, ‘This is my goal. I didn’t make my
go
al. These are the things I’m doing to try to improve to meet my goal.’ Even as a leader, you need to be able to do what you expect from your staff.”
When you strike a collaborative tone about making improvements when the scorecards are discussed, you’ll have a lot more success getting employees to support the scorecards.
“This is meant to benefit everybody and to help everybody see how we’re improving our performance,” Volovar says. “It’s not meant to intimidate or be punitive. That would take away the whole value of doing this. You have to keep it fun.”
When you talk about your scorecard in meetings, encourage your direct reports and others on down the line to openly talk about their scorecards and follow your example.
You want to create a friendly sense of rivalry and competition to help spur employees to do better. When you keep it friendly, you keep the goal on making the organization better through individual effort, not seeing who can vanquish each of their peers.
“By reviewing them and making a commitment to review the scorecards at our operations committee, that too keeps it alive,” Volovar says. “That’s where the fun comes in when we review them in a group setting. If we see one of our team members struggling, everybody attending that meeting is there to offer suggestions on how we could collaborate to improve our performance. It’s up to the leaders to keep this moving.”
Promote the scorecards as an objective way of helping everyone to perform better, not as a punitive system to figure out who’s the weak link.
“You need to communicate your expectations and how you believe that by using these scorecards, it’s going to provide a fair method for evaluation,” Volovar says. “If it’s documented there in the scorecard and it’s what that staff person documented, it’s fair and objective. Then you provide constant and consistent feedback.”
If someone does not feel comfortable being open about his or her performance on the scorecard, don’t put that person in a position where he or she will feel embarrassed.
“If there was a staff person that was intimidated by scorecards, we would expect the leader to work with that individual,” Volovar says. “If it was intimidating and hurtful, we would certainly not require that person to post their scorecard. You have to be sensitive. You can’t take a cookie-cutter approach with individuals. If some are not being successful and they don’t want their scorecard posted, that’s something you have to be sensitive to.”
By giving employees a supportive means of tracking their individual performance, Molina has actually opened the door to healthier collaboration, maintaining the spirit of selflessness that existed before the scorecards. The only difference is now, employees can help out without worrying about what they have or haven’t done with regard to their own responsibilities.
“It’s provided a tool for leadership to coach and mentor their teams,” Volovar says. “They are meant to help the staff be able to say, ‘How do I win and did I win today? Was I successful in what I am trying to do for the organization that I work for?’”
The scorecards have given Molina a foundation to build upon. Instead of living one emergency at a time and just working to keep up, tasks are now clearly delegated and long-term plans and projects can be implemented.
“By developing these scorecards, we’re saying, ‘This is what I want the company to achieve in a given year,’” Volovar says. “It’s broken down into individual components that will bring the company to achieving those goals. … This is meant to benefit everybody and to help everybody see how we’re improving our performance.”
How to reach: Molina Healthcare of Missouri, (562) 951-1523 or www.molinahealthcare.com