How to Answer: What would you do if an employee was not meeting their goals?
5. What would you do if an employee was not meeting their goals?
How to Answer
The interviewer wants to know how you work with under-performing employees. Be ready to provide details of your approach to handling employees who are not meeting targets or company expectations. Provide details of your management style and, if you have a real-life example, consider weaving a story into your response.
Answer Example
"If an employee is not meeting their goals, I will sit down with them one-on-one and ask them why they feel they are missing their targets. It's important that I listen and hear from their perspective why they are struggling. Together, we will review their performance statistics. A detailed review of their performance history is often constructive because it can reveal patterns and awaken the employee using evidence versus speculation. If the employee is receptive to it, I will develop an Individual Performance Plan with them and review their progress once per week until they show consistently acceptable improvement."
Admin
"If an employee were not meeting their goals, I would take an empathetic approach by taking them out for coffee and asking what I can do to support them in the workplace. If there were a recent example of their work falling short, I would refer to it to start the conversation. From there, I would help the employee to set clear goals while offering tips and tricks for increased productivity."
Manager
"Individual coaching is a large component of my role as a manager. I will find out what has been preventing my associate from meeting their goals and work with them to overcome those challenges. Perhaps something is going on outside of work, or they did not receive training to be properly equipped to exceed their goals. Once we identify the core roadblocks, we can formulate a plan to get the associate back on track."
Marketing
"When one person does not meet goals, it affects entire campaigns and project deadlines. For this reason, I hold a daily morning meeting to ensure everyone's deliverables are on time. If someone is not delivering the quality they normally do, I will ask them privately if something specific impacted their performance. I aim to have genuine conversations with my team members because their success is important to me, and it's what drives the entire team to achieve goals together."
Retail
"If someone on my team is not meeting expectations, we will have a chat before the situation becomes too damaging. I like to let the associate lead the conversation, so I will ask, 'Why do you think I asked for some of your time today?' Most of the time, the associate will open up about being disappointed for falling short of their goals. They will often offer suggestions on how they think they can improve, and we will create a performance plan with milestones and clear expectations from that point."
Sales
"I hold a sales meeting every Monday and Thursday, so it's immediately apparent if an employee's performance is slipping. We also have running scoreboards that update live sales stats, so we have a minute-by-minute update. Because our work environment is so competitive, I'm sure to connect one-on-one with every team member weekly. If their performance is not at its peak, we will get to the root of the issue together and make a few changes, such as provide additional training in an area where they are struggling. If that action is not enough to make a change, I will put the employee on an individual performance plan with clear goals and deadlines."
Teacher
"If a student were not meeting their goals, I would call a meeting with the student and their guardians. Depending on how severe the case was, I would also involve an administrative team member or the school Principal. I have a learning plan workbook for students to write down self-guided learning goals. Then, we review the goals and attach them to a timeline. This corrective approach has worked for my students for many years."
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