1. Allocating and assuring work
PowerPoint presentation
Unit 333 (M&L 11): Manage team performance
Allocating and assuring work

2. Aims and objectives The aim of this lesson is to:
provide the learner with the knowledge and skills required to identify the strengths, competencies and expertise of the team they are managing.
The objectives are for you to:
explain how to identify the strengths, competencies and strengths of the team
explain how to allocate work on the basis of the teams strengths, competences and expertise
explain how to identify areas for improvement in the team members performance.

3. Re-cap – Benchmarks and quality management
Benchmarking
Total quality management
Quality management techniques
Amending priorities and plans

4. What are strengths, competences and expertise?
Communication skills
Empathy
Patience
Respectful
Proactive
Communication skills
Customers will always ask questions, a focused customer service employee will be able to provide an answer, be able to talk in a manner that meets the needs of the customer. Good communication skills are vital within the customer service environment.
Empathy
Look at the situation through the eyes of the customer to understand better what they want.
Patience
It is vital to have patience when dealing with customers, not all customers will be polite and courteous. Some customers may find it hard to speak with people, patience in all situations is required.
Respectful
Customers should be treated with respect whatever the situation.
Proactive
Proactive is all about thinking ahead, try to gauge what a customer requires before they ask for it.

5. What are strengths, competences and expertise?
Product knowledge
Persuasive skills
Time management
Language skills
Self manage
Product knowledge
Understand the product or service that is being provided. Some employees may be considered experts in their field, this is especially true within the customer support environment. Understanding, and being able to explain, technical issues to customer will allow them to feel confident in the information being received.
Persuasive skills
Employees with good persuasive skills will not only support the customer service function but may also persuade other employees outside of their team for the benefit of their team and organisation.
Time management
A good customer service employee will have good time management skills. This skill is required to complete tasks on time and also understanding that they cannot spend too much time on any one function. This includes their dealings with customers.
Language skills
Within the diverse society today having additional language skills can support any team to achieve their goals. Within any one team it may be able to call on different members, if they have the necessary language skills, to talk with customers in their native languages if required.
Self-manage
A good team player will be able to self manage, this is similar to being proactive with customers. Self managers tend to look for tasks to complete before being asked.

6. Experience, interests and motivation
Team leaders must understand what interests and motivates their team members, they should also know their teams experiences.
Interests
Place team members in a task that interest them.
Motivation
What motivates your team members?
Experience
What experience do your team members have?
Interests:
If one of your team has an interest in IT, place them in a situation where this interest can be used. It is highly likely that this team members enthusiasm will support them in achieving the objective better.
Motivation:
There are two types of motivation:
Intrinsic – this is self motivation and can be found in people who want to learn, its aim is personal satisfaction.
Extrinsic – this is motivation provided by an outside source, this could include promotion, sales targets, monetary reward, contract requirement.
Maslow’s Theory may be discussed at this point
Experience:
Team leaders must use the experience of their team members to achieve their aims and goals. Placing an inexperienced team member with an experienced team member will support the ongoing training required of all good teams. It may also motive the experienced team members intrinsically as they are passing on their knowledge and skills. The inexperienced team member on the other hand may well be motivated extrinsically to learn and please the team member who is passing on these skills and knowledge.

7. Factors that affect a teams performance
The following factors will affect a teams overall performance to complete tasks.
Clarity of the objective
Work allocation
Team dynamics
Self-management
Quality of leadership
Skill levels
Systems and resources available
Clarity of the objective
Communication to team members of the objective is vital, if team members do not understand what is required of them then how will they achieve their objective.
Work allocation
When allocating any work to team members the team leader must consider their team members strengths, competences and any expertise they have in certain fields. Work allocation must also be fairly distributed so as not to de-motivate team members.
Team dynamics
Team dynamic are the unseen forces that impact on any team, these include friendships and work relationships. Team leaders must be able to handle, and plan against, any conflicts that may arise.
Self-management
The team leader, through knowledge and experience, will identify those that are willing to self manage. These team members may be given more responsibilities than those that do not self manage.
Quality of leadership
Team leaders must engage with their team, the affect that the leader is looking from the team is for them to follow the leader rather than be pushed. This willingness will be achieved as team members become more confident in their team leader and accept their authority in the workplace.
Skill levels
Team leader must understand that not all team members have the same skill set, in managing this leader must use their team members skills to best achieve the overall objective.
Systems and Resources available
Team leaders are required to manage the systems and resources available, if the team is to meet its objectives then team leaders must ensure they have the systems and resources necessary to complete the task.

8. Work allocation
The following must be considered when allocating work to team members:
The experience and ability of the team member.
The motivation and personal interest a team member has.
The availability of team members.
Other considerations are:
Staff development.
Types of work.
Availability of team members:
Team leaders must consider availability of their team, you may a have a very experienced individual, but you cannot use them to complete all tasks as this will affect the team dynamics.
Staff development:
Team leaders must always consider the need to develop their team members. When allocation any work consider using experienced team members to peer support other members of the team and develop their skills and knowledge ‘on the job’.
Types of work:
Some tasks are more boring than others, team leaders should consider this when allocating work. Share the workload evenly and provide all team members the opportunity to work on both boring and interesting tasks. De-motivation is a serious consideration when completing any task allocation as a team leader.

9. Work allocation When allocating any work team leaders must:
give clear instructions on how the work is to be completed
specify any quality/quantity targets to the team members
provide a timescale for completion of the task.
The task of work allocation by the team leader may be easier remembered using the acronym:
SMART
Specific: The team leader must explain exactly what is required.
Measurable: The team leader must be able to measure the team performance.
Achievable: There is no point setting a task if it cannot be achieved.
Relevant: The work allocated must be relevant to the team member concerned.
Time-bound: There must be a time frame for the completion of the work otherwise a team member may not complete.

10. Monitoring performance
The monitoring of performance is vital if continuous improvement in any organisation is to be achieved.
Monitoring performance can be achieved through:
reviewing correspondence
observation sales figures
mystery shoppers
feedback
appraisals
benchmarking.
Reviewing correspondence
Review any correspondence from customers, these include letters of complaint and thank you notes.
Observation sales figures
Sales figures can be analysed to determine if customers are returning, the spend on each visit etc. However the delivery of customer service cannot be provided by sales figures alone.
Mystery shoppers
The use of mystery shoppers will help team leaders to understand their team performance from the eyes of the customer.
Feedback
Feedback from customers can be provided by the use of comment cards; customer survey’s and face-to-face among many others.
Appraisals
Most organisations will provide appraisals to team members more than once a year, these can be used to set targets for individuals.
Benchmarking
Benchmarking can be used within an organisations to compare teams, but also useful in comparing individuals to see if they are achieving the levels expected of them. Are they meeting the targets?
All of the above will provide information to team leaders and managers to monitor the performance of the team and to focus on areas for development in the future.

11. Summary Strengths, competences and expertise
Experience, interests and motivation
Factors that affect a teams performance
Work allocation
Monitoring performance

12. Assessment

13. Any questions?