Performance optimisation can be achieved through a combination of
`carrot and stick'. In this context that is to say:

* Providing partners with the tools, resources and development
necessary to improve performance.

* Rewarding them for good performance and providing ongoing support to
promote further improvement.

* Penalizing them for poor performance and, where potential for
improvement has been identified, providing ongoing support to promote
further improvement.

* Penalizing them for poor performance and, where potential for
improvement has not been identified, taking positive action to
de-commit further resources and investment or terminating the
relationship.

Taking the final punitive measures with consistent poor performers is
as important as rewarding and investing in performers. Vendors must,
after all invest their limited resources where they can deliver the
greatest return. But this step should only be taken following an
objective analysis ideally through scorecarding.

DEVELOPING A HIGH PERFORMANCE CHANNEL

By implementing a Partner Relationship Management strategy, a vendor
commits to engage in:

* Ongoing communication and knowledge sharing with the partner network

* Ongoing training and development of individual and organisational
skills and competencies

* Ongoing motivation, incentivization and loyalty building

* Fostering sales, marketing, support and operational collaboration
between partner and vendor and across the wider partner network

* Providing an effective and high quality support infrastructure to
the partner network

* Working collaboratively in planning for and achieving success
against joint targets

All vendors have a fundamental responsibility to develop their channel
for the future, not merely to reward it for the past.

REWARDING A HIGH PERFORMANCE CHANNEL

Personnel performance management is often linked with
performance-related pay (PRP), although by no means all organisations
claiming to use performance management have PRP. Nevertheless, PRP is
an important element in many performance management schemes because it
is believed to motivate; it is said to deliver the message that
performance and competence are important, and it is thought to be fair
to reward people according to their performance, contribution or
competence.

A similar approach is often used with partner performance management
where performance-related discounts or rebates are made available
according to a partners performance against defined targets. Sometimes
this is governed by attainment of accreditation criteria but all too
often these criteria are too narrow and restricted only to those
metrics that can easily be measured. This means that accreditation is
usually based on subjective assessments of performance, and that a
performance-related discount or rebating policy can often inhibit
collaboration because of its individualistic nature, and occasionally
lead to 'short-termism'.

An alternative to PRP for personnel is competence-related pay, which
provides for pay progression to be linked to levels of competence that
people have achieved, using a competence profile or framework. By
combining performance-based and competence-based it is possible to
operate contribution-related pay scheme which means paying for results
plus competence, and for past performance and future success. This is
precisely the model supported by partner scorecarding and indeed
partner scorecarding offers the only methodology for
contribution-based discounts, rebates or rewards for partners.

RelayWare is the leading Partner Relationship Management software.
Visit our website for more information: http://www.relayware.com