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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Angel # 1: Performance Improvement

By Bruce Hodes based on an article by Miles Kierson called “The Seven Hurdles of Successful Execution”.

There is good news and here are some of Bruce’s Ideas. The age of performance improvement is upon us! Intelligent and systematic performance improvement plans are being created and implemented with real results. The signs are there. Three Laws of Performance by Steve Zaffron and Dave Logan, Great by Choice by Jim Collins and Switch by the Heath brothers outline some of these ideas and possibilities. 

In the past, when speaking to an executive and/or CEO about dramatically transforming organizational performance, one might just have well have been talking about space aliens. Now, organizational change gets people’s attention. More and more performance improvement and transformation systems are appearing.

I am reading the writing on the wall here – this age is upon us. This angel will trump the ogres every time! Mark my words. Knowing about the ogres gives you power in dealing with the Ogres. Being in the age of organizational change empowers. Organizational change game on…

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A, B, C Quick Summary

Over the past month I outlined a methodology guaranteed to drive mediocrity out of your organization, from the bottom up.  Below is a quick summary.

1. Whenever you engage with this process, it is very important that you hum Michael Jackson’s “ABC” song. That really is the secret to success.

2. Introduce the process to your organization by asking managers to read the recommended articles: “ABCs” by Bruce Hodes or “A New Game Plan for C Players” by Beth Axelrod, Helen Hadfield-Jones, and Ed Michaels.

3. In a scheduled group session with your managers, rank your employees on as A, B or C.

4. Deal with any C-Players you may have. Remember the options: put them in a new role, coach them, or ethically and honorably move on to better options.

5. Treat your B-Players as resource.

6. Identify the A-Players on your team. A-Players need plans that develop and train them so they are indeed ready to be promoted; I advise incorporating A-players as full partners in developing those plans.

7. Follow up with the leadership group in two months to ensure that issues are actually being addressed.

Watch me talk about A, B, C Players at a conference >>

The Next Steps for A, B, and C Players

What’s good about CMI's A, B, C system of ranking employees is that the issues are on the table, and managers can act accordingly.

A Plan for C-Players
Once an employee has been identified as a C-Player, there can be three resolutions:

1. He/She can be put into a new role, where his/her skill set might allow him/her to become a B-Player. For example, the engineering manager for a company I worked with was, at best, marginal in his position. He was moved from having direct reports into being part of the sales team. Since then, company sales grew dramatically, and new customers are better cared for. With an open mind and strong knowledge of an employee’s strengths, placing an employee in a new role can greatly improve outcomes.

2. The manager can take the employee on for development and coach him/her into becoming a B-Player. At this point, the employee understands that his/her job is on the line, and the manager clearly outlines the required behavioral changes. For the next few months, the manager coaches and supports the employee. Turnarounds can happen.

3. It might be decided that the only alternative is to move on and replace the employee. The decision then is how to proceed in an ethical and honorable manner. A question I ask is: “Does the employee know that his or her job is on the line?” Managers often hem and haw and say they “think so” or that the employee “should know.” The standard I set is higher: “Did you say to the employee that these performance issues need to be addressed and if they are not, he or she will be let go?” If the issues are not on the table with the employee, the first order of business is to put them there. Surprising an employee about performance issues is un-ethical. After an employee is aware of the gravity of the situation, the manager should have two months to resolve the issue one way or another. A time constraint is important in order to establish urgency.

Getting Clear
Sometimes a company’s leadership team designates a C-Player as a “sacred cow.” There has been a decision to tolerate the employee’s mediocrity. I have seen this phenomenon primarily with older workers who have a long-standing history with the company and who have been real contributors in the past. Now, for whatever reason—sometimes it is technical, sometimes it is age—the employee is not able to contribute at a higher level, but sacred-cow status remains. The employee may be coached, but it is understood that even if the employee remains a C-Player, he or she will retain employment with the company. In these rare cases, you do the best you can with the employee on a daily basis. The situation should be moderated and reviewed at least once a year.

Do Not Leave the B Players Alone
B-Players are incredibly valuable. They deserve training, development and rewards. Do not take them for granted or assume that they will necessarily remain B’s. Treat them as a real resource. Check in with them regarding their aspirations and what they want to accomplish. Find a way to help them grow in their role.

Take Ralph, a manufacturing manager, for example. He was a very loyal and dedicated employee that absolutely contributed to and embodied the culture. He successfully managed his seven productive direct reports. However he was not going anywhere else in the organization due to education, knowledge, and analytical skill limitations. Ralph preformed his job quite well and was appreciated for his overall contribution to the organization. Ralph was the epitome of a solid B player.

In order to enhance his role in the organization, the leadership group appointed him head of the safety committee. While others, mainly the HR manager and Vice President of Manufacturing needed to support Ralph in this role, it worked. The safety committee, under Ralph’s leadership, made real progress. The company received a safety award and other companies are emulating their approach. Ralph is quite proud of what the committee accomplished. He has also been asked to coach and be a resource for safety programs in other organizations. Ralph found this role to be an exciting use of his talents. He is a great example of how to take care of and developing your B players

Coming Up Short
Another positive feature of the A, B, and C process is that it can be used to identify A-Players. Once an A-Player is identified, the manager should consider creating a training and development program to be laid out in a subsequent meeting with this employee. On the other hand, if the ABC process reveals an absence of A-Players, that issue must be addressed as well. A common solution is to start intentionally hiring only potential A-Players and thus developing some real managerial growth potential within the company.

Defining the Players

The following is what I mean by A, B, or C Players

What were you thinking?
If you are a CEO or manager with direct reports who would come up with D’s and F’s in a school grading system, I cannot help you. Tolerating employees of this quality in your company, does not allow you to respond appropriately to—let alone thriving in our current business environment. These low-grade employees (and the managers who tolerate them) are impacting the rest of your organization. Not only do low-grade employees drag down the company, but they also negatively impact on your great and superstar employees.

In short, if you have more than a few D and F employees, sell the firm and do something to save yourself. Your prognosis (and that of your company) is—at the very best—grim. In the next minute, you will be falling off a high cliff. Good luck and start to pray!

Out with Mediocrity
From now on, I’ll refer to mediocre employees as “C- Players.” These employees are marginal in their performance and unremarkable in any positive attribute they bring to the workplace. They exist, take up space, and just get their jobs done, sort of.

A test for “C-ness” is putting yourself in this scenario: if one of these employees came up to you and said they were quitting, would you be relieved? Would your relief be because you’re certain you could do better by recruiting a new employee from the open marketplace? If so, you have a classic C-Player on your hands. Know anyone like this? Grab a piece of paper and make a list of those people. You will need it later on.

I’ve heard C-Players defined as employees who have bad attitudes and cannot collaborate; employees who do not have the skill sets needed to develop and execute what the job requires; and employees who do the same thing day after day and year after year. Again, Mr. or Mrs. Manager, you know you have mediocrity around you when you envision a particular employee leaving and can’t imagine feeling anything but thrilled.

In my work, I have seen companies where no one was average. Mediocrity was simply not tolerated, and because these companies set higher standards, they achieved better results in the marketplace.

Most Valuable Players
“B-Players” are great employees, real keepers, and absolutely worth their weight in gold. They are in alignment with the organization’s mission and values. As corporate citizens, they care deeply about their internal and external operations. They are probably not being promoted, but that is fine because they are doing great right where they are.

“A-Players” have all the attributes of B-Players. They also have the talent, desire, and ability to be promotable. They are interested in professional growth and development. These players, with development, could be moved to leadership either within or outside their current departments.

Warning! Pitfall
A pitfall I’ve often seen with classifying employees in this way is that managers want shades of gray. They want to rate employees as C+ or B-. They want to make excuses and dance around the issue. It is important that they stick to the A, B, and C buckets. In this process, there are no minuses or pluses allowed. Do not permit gray. Managers need to make choices and deal with the consequences. Employees are either making it as credible A- or B-Players or not. Managers need to be responsible for whom they are allowing to play in their sandbox; there are no “maybes” on the invitation.

The First Truth about Teams

1. The essence of good work team performance is not good communication or good relationships but a focus on performance and an agreed upon appreciation of what this means.


Typically in the work place people relate to each other socially. This means they are concerned with getting along and staying out of each others hair. This is not how team players relate to each other.

Basically, the difference is between how one relates to people at a barbecue and how one relates to the work group who is trying to win a big contract? The nature of the relationships is quite different. The first is based on the social context of let’s all just get along while the latter is based on the context of let’s get something remarkable done and perform together so that specific results occur.

Looking to create a performance oriented culture in your workplace? Click here.

Creating High Performance Teams

Performance within groups typically does not just happen. For a group to really perform well it needs practice. The group needs to understand the best way to organize itself for performance. This concept is commonly understood by sports teams and the military. They clearly see the need to give groups opportunities to practice. Boot Camp for the military and pre-season workouts for sports teams are the norm.

It is interesting to note in business that there is far less interest or appreciation of group development and the need for practice. Team practice, for the most part, is not factored into the business or corporate world. We form groups in business and march them into the corporate battle zone expecting them to perform and when they fail we are surprised.

This whole process was once again revealed to me as my business, CMI, went through the process of putting together a high performance work team. In 2008, we expanded our organization by one. A full 25% change growth in our employee numbers. This growth caused a change in our work mix and demands. In essence, we needed less administrative work and more research and marketing.

As we went through the expansion process, some basic truths about teams, groups, and performance helped me traverse this territory.  Over the next few weeks I will highlight some of these basic truths.

For more information about CMI, click here.

Staffing: The 1st Cornerstone of a High Performance Culture

Staffing with the best – mediocrity can work with your competition. This is the mantra of a high performance culture.

As businesspeople, we do not directly control terrorist plots, the economy, our competition, taxes, healthcare plans, or national events. But even with unions, executives and managers do ultimately control who works in the company. We should make the most of this opportunity and leverage the “people piece” to enhance our companies’ performance advantage.

Here are some suggestions for raising performance and driving out mediocrity from CMI’s ABC process.

1. Educate managers: Help them understand the definitions of A, B, and C players.

2. Jointly gauge employee performance: at specific meetings, managers should jointly assess employee performance. 

Only those who interact directly with the employee should state their opinions. This allows the employee’s manager to get candid feedback. In assessing performance, avoid grey areas – no pluses and minuses – managers must make a choice whether the employee is an A, B, C player.

3. Take action. 

Ditch the D&F’s. D & F employees will drag your company down. If you have more than a few D and F employees, sell the firm and do something to save yourself.

Decide what to do with your C players. “C Players” are mediocre employees; these employees are marginal in their performance and unremarkable in any positive attribute they bring to the workplace. They exist, take up space, and just get their jobs done, sort of. A test for “C-ness” is putting yourself in this scenario: if one of these employees came up to you and said they were quitting, would you be relieved? Would your relief be because you’re certain you could do better by recruiting a new employee from the open marketplace? If so, you have a classic C-Player on your hands. What do you do with them? Give them a new role, develop them in their current role, or ditch them.

Distinguish between A vs. B: The difference between A and B players are their ability to be promoted. B players are great and loyal employees. They are valuable and skilled at what they do. A employees have the drive and the focus to take all the great aspects that B employees have and they are promotable way beyond where they are now. They are the rising stars in the organization and destined for leadership.

4. Follow up: check on the status of the manager’s decision and actions

 For more information about CMI's ABC Process click here.