Managing Employee Performance…what’s that about leading a horse to water?

I saw this picture today on my way home on the Reach Out Australia Facebook Page and maybe my brain was still switched onto HR mode but it reminded me of a few conversations I have had recently about how hard it is to manage employee performance when the employee just seems completely miserable.

You know the situation. You sit across the table from the person and they are just so angry, or depressed with everything. They have traveled down that spiral and you fear that nothing you say or do can stop this from turning out badly. Maybe you know someone who has been in that position. Maybe you’ve been in that position yourself.

I know that when I sit across the table from that person, I just want to really ask them “Are you happy?”.

I want to get them to reevaluate their lives and find out what is making them unhappy. Are they unhappy with what they are doing at work? Are they unable to find meaning in coming to work everyday? Is there something outside of work that is impacting on their ability to keep it together at work? Are they eating and sleeping well?

I’ve tried asking the “Are you happy” question on only a handful of occasions when I’ve felt overwhelmingly that it wasn’t just about work, there had to be something else making them just so miserable.

The first time was with an older male who was just so angry and aggressive with me. After I learned to hold my ground with him, I was very honest with him and tried to voice my concern and discuss what we could do to change how he felt. He angrily told me that each and every encounter with me was a waste of time and that he would rather not waste his breath having the conversation with me. I later found out that he started going to anger management counselling. I hope things turned out well for him.

On another occasion, I shared some information about the book ‘Making Australia Happy’ that I was reading and said that there was a test online that you could do. I said that it wasn’t part of the performance management plan and that he didn’t have to share anything with me, but that he might like to have a look online and have a think about what he likes doing and to assess whether he was happy. Not long afterwards, he resigned and took up one of his passions full time.

I know a lot of this is about how you have the conversation but I’d be interested to hear other people’s experiences with this. Do you have any other tactics that might also help? Is it right to challenge people in this way or should you leave the choice purely to them? All thoughts welcome!