Performance Management for HR Business Partners Training Course

Course overview

HR Business Partners are expected to turn performance management from an annual administrative cycle into a reliable source of workforce decisions. That means resolving inconsistent ratings across leaders, challenging weak goal-setting, identifying performance risks early, and ensuring talent decisions are evidence-based. When calibration is poorly run or managers lack confidence in performance conversations, organisations face rating inflation, disengagement, regrettable attrition, weak succession pipelines, and avoidable employee-relations exposure.

This five-day course equips HR Business Partners to design, govern and improve performance management processes across business units. Participants learn to diagnose process failures using performance data, build goal and competency frameworks, coach managers through difficult performance conversations, facilitate rating calibration, apply performance improvement plans appropriately, and connect performance outcomes to succession, development and reward decisions. The course also covers dashboard measures, bias controls, documentation standards, and the use of HRIS data to identify trends requiring intervention.

Teaching combines instructor-led frameworks with realistic HRBP casework, calibration simulations, manager-coaching role plays, spreadsheet analysis and peer review. Participants work with practical templates for goal-quality audits, calibration agendas, nine-box talent reviews, performance improvement plans and management dashboards. By the end of the week, each participant leaves with a tailored Performance Management Improvement Plan for a selected business area, including governance actions, manager enablement activities, metrics, risks and a 90-day implementation roadmap.

The course is designed for experienced HR practitioners who influence line leaders and own performance, talent or people-partnering activity. It is particularly valuable for HRBPs supporting business change, rapid growth, inconsistent management capability, or a redesign of the annual performance cycle.

Course objectives

By the end of this course, participants will be able to:

• Diagnose performance-management breakdowns using process maps, employee feedback and rating-distribution data
• Design SMART and outcome-based goal frameworks aligned to business-unit priorities
• Facilitate rating-calibration meetings using evidence standards, challenge questions and bias controls
• Coach line managers through performance conversations using the SBI feedback model and structured questioning
• Construct legally defensible performance improvement plans with milestones, support actions and review dates
• Build a nine-box talent review using performance evidence, potential indicators and succession criteria
• Create Excel and Power BI performance dashboards that track rating patterns, goal quality and completion risks
• Produce a 90-day Performance Management Improvement Plan with governance, stakeholder actions and success measures

Benefits of attending

Target competencies

Who should attend

• HR Business Partners — who must improve manager practice and translate performance evidence into workforce decisions
• Senior HR Business Partners — who lead performance governance across complex business units
• HR Managers — who own annual performance cycles, policy application and escalation routes
• Talent Management Managers — who connect performance outcomes to succession, development and talent reviews
• People Partners — who coach leaders on ratings, feedback and underperformance cases
• HR Centres of Excellence Specialists — who design performance frameworks and need field insight from business-facing HR

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should have practical HR experience and a working understanding of an organisation's performance review cycle, including objectives, manager reviews, ratings and employee-development discussions. Familiarity with core HR concepts such as competency frameworks, employee relations, succession planning and confidentiality is assumed. Participants should be comfortable reading basic Excel tables and discussing people data; advanced spreadsheet or analytics skills are not required. Bring examples of your current appraisal form, rating scale or process guidance where permitted. No prior Workday, Power BI, psychometric certification, legal qualification or specialist talent-management certification is required.

Training methodology

The course uses short instructor-led briefings to establish methods, followed by applied HRBP work. Participants audit sample appraisal data in Excel, facilitate a simulated calibration meeting, practise coaching a resistant manager, and assess performance improvement plan documentation against evidence standards. Case studies cover rating inflation, weak objectives, alleged bias and succession decisions. Small groups compare intervention options for different business contexts, while the instructor provides targeted feedback. The final session is an application workshop in which participants build and peer-review a 90-day improvement plan for their own business area.

Course outline

Day 1: Diagnosing performance management effectiveness

• Performance management as an HRBP operating system
• End-to-end performance-cycle process mapping
• Rating-distribution analysis and rating-inflation indicators
• Goal-quality audits using SMART and outcome measures
• Manager capability diagnostics and employee listening data
• Performance-management risk registers and control points
• Stakeholder mapping for business-unit interventions

Workshop: Participants analyse a case-company performance cycle and produce a root-cause map identifying the three highest-priority process failures.

Day 2: Goals, feedback and manager capability

• Business strategy translation into team and individual objectives
• SMART goals versus output, outcome and behavioural measures
• Competency frameworks and observable performance indicators
• SBI feedback model for reinforcing and corrective feedback
• Coaching managers through resistance and defensive responses
• Check-in cadence, agenda design and documentation prompts
• Manager toolkits for goal-setting and performance conversations

Workshop: Participants conduct a manager-coaching role play and produce a revised goal set and check-in guide for a poorly performing team.

Day 3: Calibration, fairness and performance decisions

• Evidence thresholds for performance ratings
• Calibration meeting design, roles and decision rules
• Bias risks in ratings and structured challenge techniques
• Rating-distribution interpretation without forced ranking
• Calibration facilitation scripts and escalation routes
• Documentation standards for rating rationales
• Communicating calibrated outcomes to managers and employees

Workshop: Participants facilitate a simulated calibration panel and produce a documented rating decision log with challenge notes and follow-up actions.

Day 4: Underperformance, talent and workforce insights

• Differentiating capability, conduct, motivation and role-fit issues
• Performance improvement plan structure and milestone design
• Support measures, review meetings and evidence capture
• Linking performance data to nine-box talent reviews
• Potential indicators and succession-readiness criteria
• Employee-relations boundaries and escalation considerations
• Performance dashboards in Excel and Power BI

Workshop: Participants build a performance improvement plan and a draft dashboard that identifies rating, completion and talent-risk patterns.

Day 5: Embedding sustainable performance governance

• Performance-management governance models and accountabilities
• HRIS workflow design in Workday Performance Management
• ISO 30414-aligned human capital reporting considerations
• Manager communications and adoption planning
• Performance-cycle metrics and leading indicators
• Quarterly review routines and continuous-improvement loops
• Ninety-day intervention planning and executive sponsorship

Workshop: Participants produce and present a 90-day Performance Management Improvement Plan for their business area, including metrics, owners, risks and implementation milestones.

Tools & standards covered

Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Power BI, Workday Performance Management, ISO 30414

A typical training day

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in the East Africa Time zone, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

How you can take this course

Certification

Participants who complete the full five days receive the Skillset Development Certificate of Completion, stating the course title, course code, dates and delivery format — suitable for professional-development records and employer reimbursement.

Frequently asked questions