WHY PERFORMANCE EVALUATIONS ARE SO PAINFUL
There are three types of organizations when it comes to performance evaluations. The first type does not use any evaluation or what they use is adhoc, infrequent and unreliable. Those firms get what they deserve. The second type of organization tries to take the process seriously. Unfortunately, they overinvest in the idea and create a time sucking burden the likes of which have been rarely seen. All that effort, yet it is not clear that the process helped employees and added value to the organization. Finally, there is a third type, a tiny group. They get it. The process adds value and is not cumbersome. They focus on people’s strengths, they limit the paperwork and they do not deliver evaluations at the same time as information regarding raises or bonuses.
For many years now, instead of focusing on people’s strengths, organizations have been attempting to measure employees against a generic template of “competencies.” The competency identification approach has noble intentions. Let’s see if we can figure out what it is that makes people thrive in our organization! What specific characteristics, skills and behaviors truly separate the mediocre from the proficient from the over-achievers? If you work at a large firm you are no doubt familiar with the lengthy list of competencies that are tied to different roles and levels of advancement. It can be mind numbing. Thanks to our friends in HR and the consultants they hired, there is no shortage of lists containing the knowledge, skills and abilities for any given role in the firm.
My apologies to those of you who have developed this list of competencies used to train, develop and evaluate employees. I do not mean to offend, but they have some problems. First, as I noted, there are too many of them. They need better focus. Next, most employees do not understand them. Frankly they read like a scholar wrote them – and that is not a complement.
• The ability to sufficiently manage ambiguous situations and remain productive when faced with incomplete information.
• The ability to effectively develop employees’ skills to increase unit performance.
• Able to interface successfully with internal and external parties.
• Successfully develops self and demonstrates appreciation of continuous learning.
How exactly do you measure these things? You really cannot get past a great deal of subjectivity, thought we try. It makes for fun reading too. So there are too many competencies, they are often too vague and they are tough to measure. What else?
How they are identified is often suspect. There are typically two ways they are created: the thumb in the wind approach and the bad math approach. The thumb in the wind approach is subjective and relies on a poor sampling of known cases of people, their traits and behaviors and their successes or failures. We saw Tom do A, B and C and Tom is very proactive – his track record is flawless. Being proactive goes on the list. Jenny is gregarious, she is highly responsive to customers and her sales are among the highest in the firm. Gregariousness and attention to customer concerns go on the list. Chester is an introvert, eats liverwurst sandwiches and has never been promoted. Liverwurst is off the list. Scary stuff. A better approach might be objective, systematic, analytical and rigorous. Time for fun with math. Now we plug tons of variables into some software program – employee names, personality traits, behaviors and outcomes (awards, roles held, promotions, etc.). We chug through a few regressions trying to find out what predicts success, and whamo! There it is. Our prototypical achiever is a white male, age 45, wears Brooks Brothers suits, golfs, is outgoing, articulate, a great problem solver, and vacations in Florida each year. Send this straight over to HR so we can start developing more winners!
Not so fast Mr. Wizard. Regressions are based on correlations and correlations do not imply causality. It is true, look it up. This explains why you will see some odd things pop up on the competency lists. Like height. I am not kidding. Thought we had dismissed that one fifty years ago? I recently heard a speech by some well heeled HR consultant who touted his amazing database of information on successful managers. One of the best predictors of success was height. I have no doubt there is little truth to the height = success equation, but apparently he was making some bucks. If you are going to go the math route, use some common sense, hire some serious mathematicians, and no matter what they come up with, keep height off of the list. Besides, just because some competency explains one person’s success, it does not follow that another person needs strength in the same competency in order to be successful.
Like I said, we need focus. Do not listen to the consultants – less is more. Let me ask you, if you have one hundred competencies you are using to train and develop your employees, how much time do you expect them to allocate to working on them during a normal month? Ten minutes? That is not too much to ask, is it? Each of them must be worth at least that much if they deserved to be on the list. So that is 1000 minutes of not working so that they can ponder the competencies. That is over two full days per month. This does not include any training they endured that month mind you. That also does not include any time you spend running your troops through tests and assessments to see where they rate on each of the competencies. This is just them contending with the labyrinth-like list you created. Way to go.
I suggest you start by cutting down the list of competencies by at least 50%. Next, do not use the list in the evaluation process for the purpose of ratings. Instead spend the majority of your leadership team’s employee evaluation-related time on two things. First, identifying each individual’s strengths. Second, finding ways to leverage those strengths. To the degree that you identify strengths, it might be useful to reference that competency list to see what if anything we know about people with this strength. Use that information to provide more useful feedback, to shape roles. Can you still use 360 degree approaches? In my opinion, yes. However, the forms used and time required for the process must be cut dramatically. How about this: ask any rater to comment on things the target person can “continue,” “stop,” or “start,” and limit any scales you give the person to one page. Follow this advice and I promise you will increase the value added through this process while simultaneously reducing the cost significantly.
One final thought. If you want your people to take the evaluation process seriously, do not tell them about their raises and bonuses (or lack thereof) during the formal performance evaluation meeting. I do not care how thoughtful your approach. I do not care if you have taken my advice and erred on less is more, strengths not competencies, etc. If the employee knows that at the end of this forty-five minute evaluation session they will find out whether they got a 2% raise or an 8% raise you have just wasted your time. They will be more belligerent, they will discount your feedback more, they will flat out not listen well because they feel such anxiety about their compensation. Do yourself a favor and decouple these issues. Here is the good news. With a few common sense moves, your evaluation system might actually do what evaluation systems are supposed to do – help people!
About the Author: Dr. Dewett is a business professor, author, consultant and speaker specializing in leadership and organizational life. As quoted in the New York Times, BusinessWeek, the Chicago Tribune, MSNBC and elsewhere. His new book is Leadership Redefined. Find out more at drdewett.com. Copyright 2008 TVA Inc.
More articles by dewettarts
Print Article | Download PDF | 63 views | Feb 16 2008
|
|
