In thinking through how to effectively deal with poor performers in your organization,
ask yourself these five important questions:

Are there people on your team who are not performing up to the expectations of
the job?

• Over time, the poor performers ultimately hinder the productivity of even the best
  employees.

Are you walking the talk regarding your brand?

• Are your top performers listening to you preach about the brand and its values/benefits,
  only to witness poor performers getting by just as easily as before? Leaders who allow
  poor performers to ride the coattails of the strongest members of the team will ultimately
  lose credibility.
  

Are there members of your team whom you would not hire again if given
the opportunity?

• If so, you are losing the war on poor performance. There are three ways to handle
  this situation:
• Inspire the individual to learn what it will take to become a great performer.
• Motivate the individual to try another position within the company where his/her energy
  and skill may be better suited.
• Terminate the individual who does not positively represent the company’s brand and
  who does not have what it takes to live it in his/her daily work. Rarely do leaders
  fire someone and then say, “I wish I had kept him/her a little longer.” In fact, most
  often they wonder why they didn’t do it sooner.
  

Do your people know how they’re doing?

• Great leaders don’t allow employees to wonder. If they are doing great, these leaders
  let them know. If they are doing just okay, they let them know. And if performance
  is hindering progress, they let them know that, too. Leaders must care enough to confront
  performance, otherwise they risk losing the respect of their top performers.

Do you set realistic expectations for success and attach deadlines
for success?

• When someone isn’t performing as expected, you have to take the time, energy, and
  focus to redefine for that person what success looks like and establish a benchmark
  for accountability. Doing so will instill the urgency and focus required for the employee
  to have the greatest opportunity for success.
  

Essential
characteristics of effective brand-building leaders include: strong beliefs around
the brand, an ability to communicate those beliefs as part of a compelling vision
for success, and the courage and energy to manage a culture transformation.

Leadership needs courage to:

• Confront
  all levels of the organization with the business reality in order to help others understand
  the need for change.
  
• Reallocate
  resources to fuel the implementation of the brand strategy.
  
• Make
  difficult decisions to keep the brand-building momentum alive. In many cases, these
  are people-related decisions that are in the best interest of the company. It takes
  courage to make them.
  

Like
the (not-so) Cowardly Lion, now you’ve got
courage. You’ll also need another powerful ingredient to drive sustainable brand-building: energy.
So, take a long sip of the proverbial Red Bull and
start sharing it with others.

Leadership needs energy to:

• Raise
  the expectations for performance and accountability. Leaders will need to demonstrate
  consistent focus on aligning the brand strategy and associated behaviors with individual
  job category behaviors. This energy starts at the top and permeates throughout the
  organization, infusing accountability in carrying out necessary performance evaluations
  and assessments. Keep in mind that people respect what you inspect. Have the courage,
  energy, and focus to consistently inspect.
  
  
• Recognize
  and reward employees who model the required behaviors and deliver the desired brand
  experiences. Again, leaders must keep the energy level up and stay focused on the
  art of finding success in others and sharing them throughout the company.
  
  

The
best brand-driven leaders in the world are rarely the smartest people in their company
or have the most dominating personality, they just know how to muster the courage and
tap into the energy necessary
to build and sustain the brand.

Given my line of work, I have the pleasure of regularly meeting and
presenting to some of the top business leaders in the world and some of
the truly worst. What’s interesting is that I learn as much from the
best as I do from the worst. The biggest difference I notice between
the best leaders and the worst leaders is the self-awareness of the
purchase and influence power these leaders have. The strong leaders
recognize they play a MAJOR role in infecting culture change and
sustaining the ideal culture throughout their organization. The worst
leaders delegate or completely underestimate culture change and culture
sustainability.

Only leadership has the power to ensure brand and cultural success. There are two
types of power:

1. The power to purchase – Both knowledge and money are required to execute
culture/brand strategy. Leaders are fully aware of the company business plan, its
objectives and strategies. They must know and communicate key strategic information
in order to justify investing in culture-transforming strategy.

2. The power to influence – Executing culture/brand strategy requires focus,
passion, and persistence. Leaders must have the power and persistence to keep fellow
leaders and employees focused on strategy, day in and day out regardless of industry,
product, or service changes. Leaders have the ability to heavily influence their organization
through a strong focus on consistent communication and the demonstration of behavior
in alignment with the organization’s strategy.

Let’s face it: A company cannot successfully implement a culture/brand strategy without
leaders as champions. Leaders have the ultimate power because they understand the
whole package regarding the growth of the company.

Implementing a successful culture/brand is leadership’s responsibility. Leaders need
to check their enormous egos at the door and get it done…it’s their job!