Performance Is a Partnership: Why Teams Need a Shared Picture of “Good”

I can't tell you how many times I've walked into an organization and heard the same pattern playing out.

HR is frustrated that processes aren't being followed. Operations is frustrated that HR slows the work down. Managers are stuck in the middle, trying to figure out which version of "what matters most" to listen to.

It rarely shows up in big meetings or formal check-ins. You hear it in the quieter moments when someone lets their guard down in a passing comment or a worn-out tone.

Sound familiar?

And usually, no one’s doing anything wrong. They’re all doing what makes sense from where they sit.

They just aren’t sitting in the same place.

HR is solving for employee experience. Operations is solving for revenue and results. And managers are trying to execute and appease both, often with conflicting guidance about what "good" actually looks like.

So performance that should feel steady starts to drift because these three important groups are moving in parallel, but not together.

What can we learn from this? Performance doesn't belong to any one of those groups. It lives in the space between all three.

We tend to assign performances to a single team. But in practice, it requires three perspectives working together:

• HR, who understands people, consistency, and culture
• Operations, who understands business delivery and tradeoffs
• Managers, who understand what's actually happening in real time

Their collective effort keeps an organization’s strategy moving forward. Each one sees something the others don't. Each one shapes the conditions that either support performance or make it harder to sustain.

When they are aligned, the work feels clear.
When they’re not, the work becomes harder than it needs to be.

And we see it first in the managers.

When performance gets bumpy, it usually surfaces at the manager level first.

Maybe a team is stuck. Maybe a decision stalls. Maybe someone pulls back, because they aren’t sure about priorities.

It's easy to treat that as a manager issue. But here's what I've noticed: Most of the time, what you're seeing is a signal pointing to something upstream that isn't working:

• A process that no longer fits the work
• Priorities that shift depending on who's asking
• A workload that leaves no space for people leadership
• A decision made without shared context
• No clear way to raise concerns and get support

What I've learned after working with so many managers is they don’t create most performance problems. They reveal them. And if we pay attention to those signals, they'll show us exactly where the partnership between them and the broader organization needs attention.

So what do managers actually need from that partnership?

They need HR and Operations to work together to create five conditions. These aren't things managers can build on their own. They require the partnership to put them in place intentionally:

1. Shared role clarity – HR and Operations aligned on what managers are responsible for and what leadership looks like when it's working well.
2. Processes that support the actual work – Workflows designed to match how things really get done, not just how they're supposed to.
3. Capacity that reflects reality – Space to balance people leadership with delivery, not one at the expense of the other.
4. Guidance that builds good judgment – Enough clarity to make the right calls in gray areas with confidence.
5. Ongoing conversations that surface friction early – A way to name what's not working before it becomes a crisis.

Let me show you what this looks like in practice. I worked with an organization that needed managers to build a listening culture during a period of significant change. Instead of just training managers on creating action plans, we built infrastructure around all five conditions:

HR and Operations agreed on the expected behavior: managers would launch pulse surveys, review results with their teams, and listen for signs of stress or strain from the change, then respond. That gave everyone the same definition of what "supporting teams through change" actually meant in practice.

We embedded the behavior into existing workflows. Managers used the Listen-Learn-Act-Share framework in their regular team meetings. The process fit into how they actually worked.

We made space for it by building listening into weekly team meetings and monthly one-on-ones, not asking managers to add another thing to their plate.

We gave them structured guidance — specific questions to ask, a process to follow, clear criteria for when to escalate. HRBPs held open house sessions for when they needed coaching.

And we created feedback loops so managers could surface what was working and what wasn't through regular check-ins with their own leaders.

These actions built the bridge between what the business wanted and what managers could actually deliver.

Which is really what manager enablement is.

Manager enablement often gets mistaken for more training, but really, it’s a systemic way of supporting what you’re asking managers to do.

When done well, HR and Operations work together to ensure:

• Managers aren’t getting mixed messages
• Teams understand what’s expected and why
• Leadership feels like part of the job, not a side project

It doesn’t make it easy. It makes it possible.
And that’s often the difference between burnout and forward motion.

So if performance feels stuck in your organization, where do you start?

When something feels off for managers, it usually points to something misaligned upstream. So when I’m asked to diagnose a performance problem, I start with them first and ask, Are we stuck because of the Will, Skill, or Way?

WILL – Are we aligned on why this matters? Is it being reinforced through priorities and incentives?
SKILL – Do people have the capability and confidence to deliver?
WAY – Are the systems, processes, and tools helping, or making it harder?

You can start here too. I created a Will-Skill-Way Partnership Assessment to help you pinpoint where that friction is actually living, whether it's in alignment, capability, or structure. It shows you which conditions need attention first.

[Download the assessment here]

Here's what I keep coming back to:

What determines success isn't whether managers are good or bad. It's whether the organization has created conditions that make performance possible. And that's the part most companies haven't designed well, yet.

But you can.

And it starts with treating performance the way it actually works: as a shared responsibility across HR, Operations, and the managers who bring the work to life.

When these three groups align, not perfectly, but intentionally. Organizations get the clarity and consistency they need to execute well. And people have what they need to do their best work.

About the Author‍

Kamaria Scott is the founder of Enetic and the creator of the Manager Momentum Operating System. As an industrial and organizational psychologist and performance strategist, she helps organizations create the clarity, capacity, and support managers need to lead well. Her work focuses on strengthening the partnership between HR, Operations, and people leaders so strategy can be carried out consistently in the day-to-day.

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