Performance Management
- Conducting a Successful Employee Selection Process (online)
- Strategic Employee Onboarding
- Smooth Transitions: Helping New Employees Succeed in Your Department
- Delegating for Results
- Employee Coaching That Works
- Motivating Without Money
- Nip it in the Bud: Managing the Declining Performer
- The Boomers are Leaving: What do They Know That We Should Find out Before They Go?
- U-M Performance Management: Best Practices Website (online)
Conducting a Successful Employee Selection Process (online)
This online tutorial, available through U-M HR Recruiting and Employment Services Website, is geared to assist supervisors in finding qualified candidates and hiring the best person for the job.
You will learn to:
- Analyze department needs and establish positions
- Write accurate, up-to-date job descriptions
- Define desired qualifications
- Develop recruitment strategies that produce diverse applicant pools
- Analyze and screen resumes in a fair and non-discriminatory manner
- Interview effectively using behavioral/skill-based questions
- Make an effective job offer to the desired candidate
You will benefit by:
- Learning critical U-M hiring policies and procedures
- Posting a position that will meet or exceed your unit’s needs
Audience:
All supervisors responsible for hiring staff or having an influence in the hiring decisions
Schedule Selection(s) |
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Cost: No Charge |
Dates & Times: This online tutorial is available anytime at www.hr.umich.edu/empserv/department/empsel/index.html |

Strategic Employee Onboarding (online)
Are you starting new employees off the right way or driving them out the door? In this self-paced online tutorial, you will learn how to develop an experience that leaves a new employee motivated and excited to be a part of your unit for the long haul.
You will learn to:
- Recognize the importance differences and impact between orienting and onboarding employees
- Identify typical barriers that prevent employees from feeling engaged, motivated and productive upon beginning their new job
- Identify the 9 best practices in a successful onboarding process
- Create or revise your unit’s orientation plan to include best practice onboarding activities
- Determine the best ways to effectively leverage technology within the onboarding process
- Evaluate and add onboarding activities that address a multi-generational workforce’s unique learning and engagement needs
You will benefit by:
- Receiving a simple process and job aids to immediately adapt for your unit’s use
- Creating a first and lasting positive impression on new employees
- Accelerating a new employee’s productivity time on the job
- Enhancing your unit’s ability to retain talented employees
Audience:
Supervisors and managers responsible for hiring new staff
Schedule Selection(s) |
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Cost: $99 |
Dates & Times: Available 24 hours a day from date of activation through 8/31/12
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Smooth Transitions: Helping New Employees Succeed in Your Department
Countless man hours are lost to employee turnover or poor job training. Come learn important processes and ideas for getting new employees up to speed fast, while exploring retention builders to improve their motivation and dedication over the long term.
You will learn to:
- Determine an employee’s learning priorities accurately
- Develop proper learning objectives for on-the-job training for job-specific tasks
- Demonstrate how to use on-the-job training techniques to successfully teach new tasks and responsibilities
- Identify ways to use organizational culture to effectively assimilate employees as part of your team
- Use team building techniques that can bring synergy and new motivation to your employees
- Develop and employ early feedback systems for continuous improvement during the orientation process
You will benefit by:
- Assuring prompt optimal performance from new employees
- Spending less time on new employee training needs
- Having more effective and motivated employees
- Realizing fewer employee conflicts and frustration
- Experiencing higher departmental productivity
Audience:
Anyone responsible for training or mentoring new employees within their department
Program note:
This classroom offering is an excellent option to or compliment with the online course, Engaging New Talent: Strategic Employee Onboarding.
Schedule Selection(s) |
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Cost: $159 |
Dates & Times: CANCELLED: Wed. 3/28/12, 8:30 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.
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Delegating for Results
You don’t need to be a manager to delegate tasks to others. This course will give you an opportunity to examine your delegation and leadership style and will provide tools, techniques and strategies to help achieve results by successfully delegating work.
You will learn to:
- Identify the process, skills and attributes required for effective delegation
- Analyze your delegation style and determine what and how to delegate work to others
- Identify methods for empowering others to appropriately respond to tasks that have been delegated to them
- Determine methods for delegating work to other team members and co-workers who may not directly report to you
You will benefit by:
- Increasing personal productivity by maximizing available resources
- Enhancing skills and knowledge needed for effectively delegating work to others
- Increasing morale and motivation
Audience:
Anyone who needs to better delegate tasks
Schedule Selection(s) |
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Cost: $149 |
Dates & Times: Thu. 3/1/12, 8:30 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.
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Employee Coaching That Works
Performance coaching is an extremely valuable tool to develop and retain talented employees.
You will learn to:
- Apply the 5 “absolutes” to successfully coach employees
- Demonstrate the 7 steps for turning around poor performance to resolve performance issues
- Use a proven method to appropriately assign tasks to employees
- Identify and successfully address various types of employee harassment
- Demonstrate effective techniques for giving feedback to employees
- Evaluate and use the right approach to deal effectively with angry or hostile employees
You will benefit by:
- Recognizing the importance of documenting employee behavior
- Understanding how various personality styles affect relationships between employees and supervisors
- Knowing the proper ways to approach employee discipline in a bargained-for and non bargained-for environment
- Becoming a more successful performance coach and motivator
Audience:
Supervisors or managers responsible for the performance management practices within their unit
Schedule Selection(s) |
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Cost: $189 |
Dates & Times: Wed. 3/21/12, 9:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m.
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Motivating Without Money
Traditional thinking about employee motivation has typically centered on pay increases and bonuses. The shrinking economy, the adoption of alternative management practices and different generations finding motivation in distinct ways necessitates changing the way we think about motivation.
You will learn to:
- Examine how to leverage your unit’s “total rewards” for greater work productivity and meaningful motivation
- Apply different motivational techniques based on generational differences
- Identify creative methods that go beyond traditional money-based motivation
You will benefit by:
- Learning how to meaningfully motivate your employees in non-traditional ways
- Gaining greater work productivity from your staff
- Motivating staff with minimal impact on your budget
Audience:
Supervisors, managers or team leads who would like to learn how to effectively motivate the people who report to them
Schedule Selection(s) |
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Cost: $159 |
Dates & Times: CANCELLED: Fri. 3/16/12, 8:30 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.
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Nip it in the Bud: Managing the Declining Performer
In today’s lean work environment, we need everyone to perform at their peak. When caught early and handled properly, you can help poor performers become valuable players on your team.
You will learn to:
- Recognize the signs of an employee who is declining in performance
- Use productive coaching strategies to hold conversations that clarify employee goals and expectations
- Apply various techniques to correct moderate-to-severe performance issues
- Identify when and how to help employees make alternate employment choices if needed
You will benefit by:
- Gaining the ability to conduct difficult performance conversations with your employees
- Addressing performance issues before they become larger problems
- Managing complex situations with more confidence and success
Audience:
Any leader responsible for managing the performance of others
Schedule Selection(s) |
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Cost: $159 |
Dates & Times: Tue. 4/24/12, 8:30 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.
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The Boomers are Leaving: What do They Know That We Should Find out Before They Go?
The Boomers are leaving but you don’t have to let their depth and breadth of institutional knowledge go with them. Learn best practices in knowledge capture to assure that when the boomers retire, you are not left to go bust.
You will learn to:
- Apply methods to capture the key institutional knowledge that long-time employees tacitly hold
- Use appropriate technologies to aid in your specific knowledge capture needs
- Recognize when and how to use techniques like storytelling, mentoring and job shadowing to assist in the knowledge transfer process
You will benefit by:
- Keeping valuable institutional knowledge in your team
- Effectively utilizing the knowledge and abilities of staff who are transitioning their careers to retirement
- Building the knowledge base of your entire team
Audience:
Supervisors and leaders who face a future where institutional knowledge may be leaving their teams
Schedule Selection(s) |
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Cost: $159 |
Dates & Times: CANCELLED: Thu. 1/26/12, 8:30 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.
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U-M Performance Management: Best Practices Website
This website presents U-M's organizational competencies along with detailed information about how they can be successfully applied by staff members and supervisors. It also describes how some units use this framework to fuel employee performance.
Schedule Selection(s) |
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Cost: No Charge |
Dates & Times: This website is available anytime at www.hrd.umich.edu/performancemanagement |

