Progress Meetings Defined

The progress meeting is not an after the fact appraisal meeting. No one is being judged or appraised. It is a proactive coaching meeting designed to produce feedback, conversation, next steps and alignment. It is designed to give power and support not to give judgment and assessment.

As a precursor to progress meetings, employees and managers work together to build a performance agreement based on the employees accountabilities and goals of the employee. Progress meetings are 30 minute meeting every two months to discuss the progress being made towards demonstrating the company values, fulfilling job accountabilities, achievement of goals.

For progress meetings, typically I wear my Sundays finest – kidding – usually I am in just shorts and sandals – kidding again. Dress how you typically dress. Certainly face to face meetings are the best. I like meeting at a coffee shop or restaurant; however, the phone and screen sharing/web conferencing work.

The rest of the progress meeting is a gap analysis between the manager’s and employee’s perceptions of the employee’s job accountabilities, demonstration of the corporate values, and the status of his/her goals. During the meeting, the employee and manager trade views. The meeting is about listening and reflecting. I have participated in this process as both employee and manager and in my opinion listening to the view and scores of the other is the best part. The meeting also lays out a great process from which to hold conversations about performance.

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Types of Meetings

Many different meetings occur in business between managers and employees. The most typical meetings can be categorized firefighting meetings. Firefighting meetings occur on an ad hoc basis to solve specific problems such as: 1. Customer X did not get the right product; 2. Machine number 6 is not functioning properly; etc. The purpose of these meetings is simply to resolve issues. Issues discussed are hot topics that need to be resolved immediately. A progress meeting is not this kind of firefighting meeting.

Another type of meeting is a departmental meeting. In this type of meeting participants shuffle into a conference room and sit around. Someone speaks and updates on various issues. Frequently, people’s attention wanders off and they do not pay attention. They might look like they do but they actually are not and may well be texting and the like. At the end of the meeting everyone shuffles out of the conference room and scurry off to their next meeting. This process repeats. A progress meeting is not that kind of meeting.

Then there is the yearly appraisal process with associated meetings. This is least celebrated and underappreciated type of meeting that goes on in organizations. In fact in most organizations it is downright hated. Typically this meeting occurs at the end of the year. It entails the manager evaluating the employee’s accomplishments and skill development. This process turns into a bureaucratic chore pushed by HR so that they can update their records. Most of the time the employees’ goals were not tracked or discussed during the year thus the appraisal is often incomplete and inaccurate. The yearly appraisal becomes an exercise which corporate citizens participate in without a lot of enthusiasm or energy.

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A Keyne Way to Coach Employees and Improve Performance

I have run my own business and coached employees for years but the whole notion of calling meetings between employee and manager “progress meetings” is something I learned from Wayne. Most of this material comes out of my collaboration and association with Wayne Nelsen and the Keyne Method. Wayne is the president of Keyne Insight, a firm dedicated to identifying and proving the concepts of execution management. He is also the creator of KeyneLink; a cutting edge execution management system that is used by many companies globally.

The distinction between progress meetings and all other meetings is simple and elegant and makes all the difference in changing the context of the meeting. The meeting is not an appraisal meeting where the manager is judging the accomplishments or lack thereof. A progress meeting is a formal opportunity to review, reflect and give feedback on the progress that the employee is making on their goals. More on this in the next couple blog posts.

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