Report on Performance Management

1
Report on Performance Management

2
Assessment Task 1
Australian Hardware was founded in the year 1921 by Percy Greenwright and in the year 1982,
the company became a public company listed on the Australian Stock Exchange
(Australian Hardware, 2019a). With more than 138 stores throughout Australia, Australian
Hardware Company provides variety of products in their product categories and their resources
are located in major cities and large regional centers in Australia (Australian Hardware, 2019b).
The mission of Australian hardware is to provide best quality hardware products, Garden
supplies and building materials to Australia and all over the world. The success of the company
is dependent on its people. With the motive of growth and improvement, Australian Hardware
provides opportunities for payment and growth. Employees are an important asset for the
company. They receive individual performance plan at the end of the year and their performance
is reviewed with each subsequent year of employment. Australian Hardware aims at providing
safe working environment free from harassment and discrimination. The company ensures equal
opportunity for the existing as well as the future employees (Lukas City Institute, 2019). The
company has been efficient in terms of hiring the skilled people and retaining them by providing
training and development opportunities for the existing and upcoming staff.
The company puts its effort in making the employees efficient in order to accomplish the
predetermined organizational objectives. Every company has different policies and procedures to
assess the performance of their employees, but universally the performance of employees and
measure by their productivity and behavior. Employees are coping with their individual targets
within the organization, failure to which will require training and development to enhance their
skills so that they can achieve their targets in the given time. Generally, poor performance is due
to lack of skills, knowledge and expertise in their respective areas, and low levels of
productivity. A proper training and counselling session will help employees to achieve the target
but if not, the company will be bound to terminate them. In the following case Australian
Hardware, Wollongong store, the performance of hardware and home products of the store
requires to be managed. The duty of the Hardware and Home Product Manager is to allocate the
work according to the skills and knowledge of employees so that they can provide with the
desired results. The performance of employees is dependent on their productivity level and
adhering to the policies framed by the company. It is often seen that, providing feedback helps in

3
improving the future performance of employees. This is because, feedback analyses the mistakes
of employees, improve them inspire to do better in future. It is always not necessary for
employees to achieve performance excellence but employees are required to perform effectively
without any misconduct.
As opined by Cohen (2017), managers ensure that each and every employee has been provided
with developed work plan. A work plan south lists out the job role, goals and expectations
performance of an employee. The employees are required to follow this work plan and take the
support and agreement of the management as and when required. Work plans ensure that
employees perform as expected and this will be discussed with them and necessary feedback will
be given. According to the scenario, the Hardware and Home Products Manager is required to
assess the performance of its Sales Consultants as well as the admin staff as they generate
business for the company. The creation of a work plan or employee development plan should
provide employees with a clear direction and better opportunities to enhance their skills in order
to reach new heights in their career. This will not only benefit the employees but also improve
the overall productivity of the organization. In order to develop plan, managers should consider
the business goals and accordingly align the development goals with the business goals. It is not
necessary that employees will always be motivated and perform according to the set standards,
but having a conversation with them informally will give a better understanding of their career
goals and the challenges they are facing while working. As suggested by Smith, Patmos and Pitts
(2018), this will help both managers and employees to identify the ways to address their issues
and improve the performance. Performance assessment refers to identifying the difference
between the current position of the employee and where it wants to reach. Training and
development is one such effective ways of enhancing employee skills and improving their
performance. Lastly, creating a plan with specific goals will help the manager to get impossible
return on investment. The current work plan for Australian Hardware will comprise of the
following-
1. Legislative framework, regulatory requirements, governing organizational policies and
Procedures, applicable awards and agreements.
Australian Hardware follows proper legislations for the betterment of the employees. The
employees will be provided with equal employment opportunities without any discrimination

4
and harassment. There will be policies of anti-discrimination and health and safety of employees.
In order to improve the overall performance of the company, the legislative framework will
include training to the poor performing and new employees. Terminating the employees shall be
considered only at times of serious misconduct. Employees will be awarded with both monetary
and non-monetary benefits depending upon their performance on a regular basis. In the given
scenario, the Sales Consultants will receive equal employment and wages. A certified agreement
will be made between the employees and the employer after negotiating the wages and other
employment related benefits.
b. What is the target for next 12 months?
The target for next 12 months for each Sales Consultant will be to generate $1.25 million for the
financial year. Along with that, the consultants are expected to maintain a transparent working
and ensure better customer engagement aligned with Australian Hardware requirements. For the
next 12 months, the staff will generate leads, contact them, demonstrate and explain the products,
close the sales and maintain a follow up process. The weekly and monthly sales report will be
given by them on the basis of their performance. It will be ensured that the employees undertake
at least two professional development for a year. Tony, Mary, Rod and Jeff will be responsible
for personal selling and Lin, Kate and Su will be responsible for servicing walk-in customers at
the store to generate business.
c. What are the key performance indicators?
The key performance indicators of the Sales Consultants are expected to be their sales revenue
(price per unit sold*number of units sold). The prospecting activities will include meetings with
potential clients, client calls/emails, product demos, and closing the sales will determine the
performance of the Sales Consultants. The number of leads each sales consultant generates and
the conversion rate, closing rate and the amount of target reached will be their performance
indicators. The customer retention rate and the sales growth of each quarter will be analyzed to
check the performance of the sales consultants and check for any further scope of improvement.
In the next 12 months, the performance will be measured basing upon the key performance
indicators and relevant strategies will be framed in case of non-performance of the Sales
Consultants.