We all wish we had the cream of the job seekers crop to choose from, but that is not always the case. Even if you do that does not mean you’re going to be free of all employee problems. The best companies in the world can still become overwhelmed by the challenges of employee engagement, performance management, employee retention and employee empowerment. Enter the employee transformation system or performance improvement plan.

In this video series you will learn how I found myself in the employee problem quagmire and the simple idea that changed how I view employees and also myself. Then I’ll share with you the performance improvement plan and strategy that I have developed to successfully hire and shape some of the most challenging employees into my star employees.

Reddit reddit.com/u/-tt

Well so I took the time and went through all 3 videos and to my surprise they contain a whole lot of advice.

It’s harsh to say that, but judging from the post it felt like one of those “these videos will solve all your problems with no effort at all” kind of things. I did believe that the 2nd+3rd video would be charged for or that there’d be some catch. But I was proven very wrong and I’ll gladly admit that.

These videos not only contain extremely helpful information about how to handle your employees but instead they go into the why and how so that you can develop your own way of doing it. I am really grateful for your work and I will recommend your videos to both my partner and some fellow entrepreneurs.

Please continue making videos in that style and please always keep your trailer in the beginning. It’s so refreshing to see someone offer their advice so nicely packaged that I don’t understand why there are so few comments on here.

Thank you so much!

Video 1: My employee problems and a simple idea that changed how I see people

Jump to video 1 transcription

Video 2: The “why” behind employee problems

Video 3: A proven employee transformation system

Performance Improvement Plan – Employee Transformation Template

The performance improvement plan worksheet below will help you

Clearly define what outcomes your employee is creating
What you want them to create
Identify believes, values, experiences and stories they hold to be true which are resulting in the undesirable outcomes
Form and test a hypothesis to become clear about the above observations

Next you’ll be guided on how to

Begin the conversation with your employee
Establish rapport and create a joint task force for change
Cooperate with the employee to develop an action plan that you both agree is just a theory to be tested
Take initial steps toward the desired outcomes. Baby steps at the outset are critical. Even minutes between initial check-ins can make the difference.

Finally you’ll see how to have them

Self-manage this process and slowly remove the training wheels
Move them toward independence
Check in periodically (baby steps again at first so you don’t slide backwards)
See their full transformation taking place

As a bonus you’ll then see how to bring the student into a tutoring role where they will being working with other employees through the same process. Naturally having had their own successes they will have rock solid conviction about the process and be able to share that success with others. Download

Video 1 Transcription: My employee problems and a simple idea that changed how I see people

Why a performance improvement plan is even needed

Hey everyone, Jesse here again. Thanks for joining me. I wanted to touch on an interesting topic and that’s employees. I keep my notes in my phones so I can bring these ideas to you. When I’m meeting and talking to people interesting subjects come up and keeping those notes in my phone helps recalling them.

I want to frame this as How to Turn Garbage Employees into Gold. It’s an edgy subject. This a problem I’ve been working through in one of my businesses. It’s taking people who are basically unemployable who have been fired over and over again and how to turn that kind of person into your star employee. The one that you go to when you need to get things done.

Not every business has a talent pool or gobs of candidates

We are sold when we go through a business school or read business books that we should be hiring only the best and there’s definitely a place for that. Not arguing that this is a great idea. There are definitely times when you just need to hire someone to get the job done. That way you can focus on other important things. This is especially the case if you’re in a rapidly evolving industry like technology.

However not every business is technology. Not every business is sexy. Not every business has gobs of potential candidates flocking from colleges looking for jobs. So if you’re in one of those industries that isn’t that attractive, doesn’t have thousands of graduates knocking on your door or there aren’t many highly skilled or talented people in your industry looking for work, what do you do?

Likely you’re going to look to the general labor pool to help and there you will find a large number of people who fit the profile that we just mentioned. Basically garbage employees. This isn’t to say they aren’t good people. They likely are. Getting work out of them? That’s a whole different subject. Getting them to show up on time, have a good attitude and take good care of the customer can seem nearly impossible. Chances of finding someone in this massive pool of potential candidates who will handle affairs the way you would is slim.

A little background on my journey to needing a performance improvement plan

I had an experience when I was perhaps 18 or 19 and while attending a technical school I had some great conversation with the instructor. The subject matter had more to do with business than with the technical information covered in the class. One thing that this instructor said in our conversation that really stuck with me was this: What one man do another man can do.

This doesn’t seem like that genius of an observation, but I thought to myself, “Cool!”. That means anything anyone else can do, I can do. Which is where I was at the point in my life. I was focusing on building my own success and how to go about doing this. I spent a lot of time looking at what other people were doing and learning from their successes and failures. That’s how most of us get started as entrepreneurs. Watching others and learning. Mimicking is how we learn many things like walking, riding a bike and so on.

At some point we realize, “I’m doing this! Now how can I help others do this too?” so later as I had some of my own accomplishments the full scope of what that instructor had said, “What one man can do, another man can do”, started to really sink in. This means that anybody, your family, friends, employees, anybody can do what any other person can do. We all have it in us to do whatever it is that we put our minds to. Now this is a bit dogmatic, but the idea is solid. We determine our own abilities outside of natural limitations.

It finally sinks in when you move into employee land

The full impact of this realization didn’t hit me until I got deep into employee land. Anyone who has tried to grow beyond themselves in a business, what Michael Gerber refers to as moving from infancy to adolescence in a business, knows that as soon as you have to delegate tasks, willing or unwillingly, you’re going to have to hire employees. Some people hire friends, family members or other acquaintances. When you boil it down though there just aren’t enough of these contacts to grow a big business so you’ll likely have to hire someone you’ve never met.

When take this first step into employee land you immediately realize they aren’t you! They can’t do what you do! If they could, well, they’d be you!

This puts a huge strain on our business plan. You have all these customer, all this growth, all this great marketing, great products, tons of demand, but in the end you don’t have any way to fulfill all that demand.

A lot of really great businesses die during this transition because they can’t that transition from being a great tiny or micro business into a small business and still get people to do their work.

When I found myself in this position is when it came into focus that I needed to figure out how to get other people do the things that I do. I started again looking at other businesses and studying them to see what they do.

How are all those other successful businesses doing it?

Forgive me for going here, but one of the most studied businesses is McDonalds. They are able to get pretty much anyone to produce a consistent product. I’m not at all endorsing their products as good, that’s a different topic altogehter. However the fact remains that they are able to get average everyday people off the streets, into their restaurants and produce a consistent product all around the globe every single day. A pretty amazing accomplishment. Something few of us can do even slightly. We can’t even get to them to show up, care slightly or produce a consistent product.

This realization is what was really hitting me hard when I was forced to ponder, “What one man can do, another man can do”.

So I started to look at my employees and say, “If I can do it…”. Here I am, I’ve got my business, my products, my services and I’m making money. I’m doing REALLY good. I mean my living is above that of many well educated people with excellent jobs. However I want to grow beyond myself. I have more demand than I can handle. I have more customers than I can personally service. I need help! So I start hiring people and the business starts to fall apart.

Why is this? Simply because when we hire someone we aren’t just hiring a warm body, we’re bringing all of them to our business. Their ideas, values, beliefs, experiences and so on. This is a huge undertaking. This is where many companies make a critical mistake. It puts a lot of pressure on our business because we might have value systems which don’t align, beliefs systems that don’t align and so on. At this point in the relationship you’re really back at a grade school level where you’re having to realign a persons belief systems to align with yours.

We’re starting to get into why most businesses are hiring the wrong people to being with, but we’ll save that topic for another video.

What makes a person successful isn’t strength, intelligence, speed, agility.

As I worked with employees I came to realize most cases strength, intelligence or speed was not what was keeping these garbage employees from doing what I could do. I wouldn’t consider myself strong or particularly intelligent. I’m not college educated and haven’t been to any of those elite schools. Honestly I can’t even say that I’ve accomplished anything amazing or incredible in my life. One thing I have done though is build businesses and find success in them. I’ve hired people who are smarter than me, stronger than me, faster than me, more experienced than me and yet they still weren’t able to produce the results that I could.

So is it true that I just can’t hire employees at all? Is my business model broken and it just won’t work?

How to get people from one place to another, consistently

This lead me to researching how to move a person from where they are to where I need them to be. In the process this would also improve their life as well. This transformation didn’t have to be all about my business. After all if I could make their life better I was confident this would help my business be better as well. In a way I was becoming a life coach to these employees. Not because they are broken or I’m smart. There just happened to be things which I could give them which would help them in their life and in turn which help improve my life.

A short summary

At a class I spoke with an instructor. The big take away was, “What one man can do, another man can do”. I needed this at that time because it gave me the confidence that I could personally do what anyone else had done and I do just that. I pounded the pavement, built relationships and made my first six figure income. That instructor was not wrong. If you really put your mind to it and you face your fears you can do amazing things.

Problem is we at some point with all of that success have to move past us. Odds are good if you’re here on my blog you’re working with employees. Now we have to show them that what one man do, another man can do and that’s a whole new problem.

Let’s leave this here and in part two of this series we’ll start talking about people and why they are the way they are. This will help us set the foundation for a solid performance improvement plan.