As your team changes and grows, it’s important to adapt your management style and approach to both the individual employees and the shifting structure of your business.

There’s no better time to refresh your approach to performance management than after a new starter has joined.

This article is part eight of our ten-part series on hiring and onboarding. In the series, you'll learn how to prepare for the recruitment process, select the best candidate and successfully onboard your new starter. You can see other articles in the series at the bottom of the page.

It’s always useful to reflect on your own managerial style, and the following considerations are key to developing and improving your approach:

• Goal setting: A proven approach to improving performance, setting goals helps team members understand what success looks like and how to achieve it. Be careful to get the right balance between ambition and realism, to help push them forward
• Appraisals and progression: The right rhythm of appraisals and feedback can encourage employees and give them more confidence in their work. This, combined with clear and achievable opportunities for progression, will help to keep them motivated
• Delegation: As your business increases in headcount, it’s inevitable you’ll need to delegate more. It can be hard to give up control of certain areas, but it’s essential to empower employees and free you up to focus on what’s important
• Communication and checking in: Think about how you use formal meetings in combination with informal catch-ups and conversations. The better you know your employees and the more time you put into engaging them, the more feedback and information you’ll can use to improve working practices

There are a number of mistakes that are easy for managers to make. Often they come from a well-meaning place, but they can make life harder for your employees, so it’s useful to be aware of what to avoid.

• Try to stay away from goals and targets that don’t work for your employees, either because they’re difficult to measure or too complex or numerous. If you’re not sure whether yours are effective, talk to your employees about what works for them
• Don’t set your team up to fail by not equipping them with the resources they need to succeed. Before setting a target, consider whether they have the tools, manpower or time to achieve them. Do they need extra training?

You can learn more about how other business leaders have addressed issues in their business by developing good lines of communication with their employees.

• Your management style should change and evolve to fit the needs of your business and individual employees
• Having goals and targets that work for your employees will help to motivate them and deliver better results
• Trusting your employees and listening to their feedback will empower them and make you a better manager

You can revisit the previous articles in our series below:

• How to work out it’s time to hire
• Preparing to hire new employees
• Three steps to creating the perfect job advert
• Selecting the best candidate
• Four quick wins to improve your hiring process
• Confirming a new hire
• Five key considerations for new starters