DC Velocity - June 2018

Str at eg y

A R C WA R EHOU S E IM P ROV EM EN T ST UDY

common management practices are followed and to highlight differences in how they are applied. Specifically, they examined four management strategies and asked respondents whether they deployed those techniques. (While the survey did not tie specific management practices to improvements in labor retention, it did find a statistical correlation between organizations that follow the practices and those that reported lower turnover.) Those practices are as follows:

1The 360-degree review. Unlike a traditional performance review, which relies almost exclusively on feedback from the worker’s supervisor, the 360-degree review includes input not just from the worker’s boss but from his or her colleagues and their assistants as well.

More than 51 percent of respondents to our survey said they practice 360-degree reviews, soliciting feedback from a variety of sources on an employee’s performance in areas like communication (92.5 percent), teamwork (90.6 percent), leadership (83 percent), collaboration (81.1 percent), and decision-making (67.9 percent).

One of the keys to conducting a successful 360-degree review is promising anonymity to floor-level employees when asking them to evaluate their superiors. “Without keeping it anonymous, you’re probably not going to get as much out of it as if you did,” Banker said. And indeed, 92.3 percent of respondents who conducted such reviews said they kept the responses confidential.

2Training managers on effective coach- ing techniques. While there may be no one right way to coach employees, there are plenty of wrong ways—failing to provide timely feedback, yelling, and offering vague (or unhelpful) criticism, to name a few. To help keep coaching sessions on track, nearly three-quarters (73.5 percent) of respondents said they provide training to managers on how to give effective performance feedback. In fact, they consider this training so important that most companies provide it repeatedly, offering instruction to managers when they are hired or promoted ( 44. 6 percent), through a refresher course every year (42.2 percent), and after a performance review if necessary ( 30. 1 percent).

As for what’s typically covered in the training, topics range from the timing of the feedback to the clarity of the content to the method of presentation. In many cases, the sessions also included a rundown of the facility’s standard operating procedures (SOPs). (See Exhibit 4.)

3Developing objective performance measures. While it’s common practice in DCs to measure employees’ performance, the researchers found there is no clear agreement on the best way to do it.

For instance, when it came to the basis for the feedback, the survey found a wide variety of industry practices. Nearly 51 percent of respondents said they based their feedback on whether employees were following “fully documented” SOPs. But plenty of others were forced to rely on murkier standards: The remaining 49 percent said their assessments were based on SOPs they described as “mostly” or “poorly” documented.