On top of all their other duties, managers need to be aware of how well their employees are performing. If you don’t know what your staff is doing, and how well they’re doing it, how can you know when adjustments need to be made, or accolades need to be administered?

Regular one-on-one meetings, performance reviews, peer reviews. They’re all great ways to track your employees. But on top of the time they take, they also involve a great deal of paperwork. And we all pretty much feel the same way about paperwork.

Employee performance tracking software can help you keep track of how your employees are progressing in their roles while eliminating that paperwork. These systems allow companies and managers to consistently and measurably track employee performance towards department and organizational goals.

And while these systems have a lot of great benefits, some have their drawbacks as well. Understanding the pros and cons of employee performance tracking software can help you identify the best program for your needs, and use it in the most effective way.

Pro: Set clear goals

With a good performance tracking system, you can set goals and objectives for your employees. This will provide you with clear benchmarks to measure their performance. If they hit their goals in the time you’ve agreed on, then they’re performance is good, and they’re moving in the right direction. If they miss goals and objectives, you can identify who needs encouragement, help, or be put on probation to get them where they need to be.

Con: You have to decide what the goals are

It can be difficult to know what to measure to determine performance. What kind of goals and objectives make sense for each of your employees, individually? Which ones make sense for the entire team? You’ll need to take time to identify which goals are right for measuring the performance of which employee. Setting the wrong goals, or the wrong objectives, for your employee could lead to a poor result in their performance measurement.

Pro: Encourage employee development

With clear goals and benchmarks for success, you can help your employees develop their career paths. Employee performance software allows you to provide easy and timely feedback, which will help your employees understand how well they’re doing and make corrections on their own. Giving them the tools and feedback they need to make their own improvements gives them the autonomy they need to feel secure and empowered in their roles, you can even create staff badges that highlight their performance. And the more empowered they feel, the better work they’ll do.

Con: It could limit creativity

Giving your employees goals and objectives can help them understand the trajectory of their careers along with company goals, but it could also inhibit their creativity. Your employees might feel as though they need to stick to those goals and objectives and not branch out to new ideas and projects that could lead to exciting opportunities. Make sure that, when using performance tracking software, you are clear that the goals are not the be-all-end-all of their roles, and that they have the flexibility to try new things — within reason.

Employee performance tracking software is a great way to make sure your employees are doing well, but only if you use the software to its best advantage. Keeping these pros and cons in mind will help you identify the right system to get and how to use it to get the best out of your employees.

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