“I know what is expected of me at work?” is the first question of the patented “Q12 Questionnaire” of the Gallup Organisation Employee Engagement Survey. The “Q12” Employee Engagement Survey of the Gallup Organisation is one of the most widely used tools used by the organizations worldwide to measure the employee engagement / organization health / employee satisfaction. While developing the Q12, Gallup has found that the foundation of any employee engagement is the understanding of the expectation of the organization by the employee. If the employee is aware, what the organization expects from him, half the battle is won.

That is the reason why the question on expectation is put at number one followed by other questions on performance, reward and compensation management, infrastructure, recognition, growth etc. In any organization, the discontent starts when there is a mismatch between the mutual expectation of the employer and the employee. In organizations, where the employee engagement scores are on lower side, you will find that the employees are unaware about the organization expectation.

The success and failure of an individual in a organizational set-up depends upon his performance. Today, the organizations are also working on a T-20 pattern, where a employee is expected to perform from day one itself like a batsman in T-20 Cricket Match where he has to score run from 1st ball itself. For performing from day one, one has to know the clearly defined goals and objectives

Keeping in view of this important aspect of Employee Engagement, in our organisation, we have laid emphasis on the KRAs (Key Result Areas) from the first day of the new employee. The moment a new employee landed up in the organisation for joining, the first thing we do is to take him through the entire Performance Management System (PMS) including the KRA and Goal-Setting Process. In the cases of replacement joining, the duly filled-up KRA Sheet of the past incumbent is shared with the new employee and explained in detail. HR further facilitates a meeting with the HOD for further clarity and understanding of the KRAs. HR ensured that the KRAs are clear to the new incumbent and the HOD as well. In the cases of new position joining, HR get the KRAs prepared from the HODs before the joining and afterwards the same process is adopted as for the replacement joining.

For organization-wide awareness about the KRAs and the organsiation’s performance, a unique step has been taken by the HR in the form of small group workshops for the 1200 employees (excluding workmen and operators). The workshops were conducted by the HRD Head and Other HR Vertical Heads. The groups’ sizes were in the range of 25-28. The workshops were made interesting by including goals-setting games like ball in the bucket, building castle by cards etc. The workshop started with sharing of some of the corporate success stories of Dr Reddy’s, Hero Honda, Kotak Bank, M & M, Marico, Dabur, Titan etc followed by the explanation of the company’s current level of performance and brainstorming for not so great performance. Once Benchmark and current performance are discussed, we take them through the entire goal-setting process by giving them live illustrations, clarity on related terms like objectives, goals, KRAs etc. During the presentation of this section, the facilitator shares few of the duly filled-up templates of the KRAs of different departments.

Immediately after the conceptual session, a goal-setting game ‘Ball in the Bucket’ is conducted for the participants divided into 2-3 teams. The game includes goal setting planning and execution. After the game is over, faculty deliberates the observations to team where they have gone wrong and how they can move in the right direction? As the game is very interesting participants enjoyed a lot and this become the talking point of the workshop

Once the conceptual part and the goal-setting game are over, the time is for the live goal-setting. All the participants formed groups as per their department / vertical / function and discuss the broad based departmental goals, answer the questions like why their department exists? what is the expectation of their customer departments ? how their department can contribute in the top-line and bottom-line of the organization. During the group discussion the group members brainstorm on the following – a.department contribution in the performance of the organization b.how to improve upon the department’s performance c. based upon the department objectives, how to derive the SMART Goals for the individual linking to the department and the organization. At the end of the live goal-setting session, each individual have a draft duly filled-up SMART KRA of the self.

Within the seven days of the workshop, the HODs finalise the KRAs in one-to-one discussion with the individual and submit it to the HR for further action. Once the duly filled-up KRAs are submitted to HR, it is now the time for the Quality Audit of the KRAs. The Audit is done by the team of cross-functional HODs. The parameters are Alignment, Completeness, Evaluation, Measurement, Stretch and Process. The physical audit is followed by tele-audit from the field employees to know that to what extent they are aware of the Goal-setting process. Once the Audit is over it is presented to the team of HODs with improvement guidelines and action plans

At the end, it is a firm believes that, “Only people who have goals, succeed because they know where they are going”.

*Author is currently working as a GM – HR & Admn, ABG Cement Ltd. The article was written when he was working as DGM-HR, MIRC Electronics Ltd (Onida)