One of the most difficult and emotionally draining situations you face as business owners or executives is employees not meeting your expectations. How can you handle it if they are not keeping up their end of the employee contract?

Begin by taking a look at your team. Do you have the right people? Before you hire someone, think about the culture of your company, the team that you already have in place and your particular style of management. If you have a very structured environment, then youll want to hire people who can fit in to your more disciplined atmosphere. If you have a very entrepreneurial company then youll want people who are more independent. If you have talented people that fit your company culture, therell be less of a gap between your expectations and their performance.

Now that you know you have the right people and you want to narrow the gap between expectations and performance, here are four suggestions:

1) Be clear about your expectations.

Do your employees know what is expected? Have you fully acquainted them with your vision and desired outcome? Dont assume they know what it is. Communicate clearly. Once the employees knows what the vision is and youve been clear about your expectations, then let them take responsibility for achieving the goals. Your responsibility is to keep everyones focus on performance, but dont expect them to do it your way.

2) Make sure they have the tools and information they need.

This is usually the most clear-cut reason for poor performance. Is your employee afraid to let you know that she doesnt have the knowledge, tools or information she needs? This can be a tremendous time waster. Make sure youre approachable and then provide the training needed. Only training can close this part of the performance gap.

3) Get to know your employees well.

Know their particular skills, talents and needs. Know their strengths and development opportunities. Frequent meetings make it much easier to confront the employee with the gap between her performance and your expectations. Keep the communication lines open and be candid. If they arent on the right path, its important to communicate that in a timely manner.

4) Concentrate on the future.

Once you and your employee have identified the gap, and you both understand the reason it occurred:

a) Ask how she plans to accomplish her objectives.

b) Ask her what she needs from you.

c) Instruct her to set up a progress check. This process will lead to her being more invested in the results and realizing her own strengths.

Wait..theres just one more thing. What if youre reading this and you work for a manager who is still a work in progress? What can you do?

Ask for more frequent meetings;

Inform your manager of what you think your obstacles might be.

Inform your manager about your needs for mentoring or training.

Inform your manager of your ideas for success.

None of this is easy; being a good manager and a good employee is hard.

The road to making it easier is paved with both good intentions and good follow through.

2005 Julane Borth