Christian,
You ask why, once I have conducted a performance rating (described below),
I need to rank. And you wonder if the ranking would not cause the
employee to give biased or misleading information to put into the rating
process (not system, per John's point).
Well I just conducted a little experiment with some people I know that do
not work at Bean. They use pretty standard performance rating procedures.
I asked both of them if they knew their two best and two most problematic
(I hate 'worst') employees. both answered 'yes' without a moment's
hesitation. One expressed surprise that I even needed to ask. "Of course
I know, I would be irresponsible not to know this."
Exactly. It is a manager's responsibility to know who their top
performers are, and to know who their most problematic performers are, and
every manager I know can list those people in an instant. This is what I
mean by "triage". 99% of the people are in the middle. A very few excel,
and a very few have problems. How many is 'few'? In my case I have
promoted perhaps 20-30 people out of several hundred, and I have fired 3.
Out of hundreds. This meshes perfectly with Deming's position on these
issues.
Part of the reason I rank (triage) people is because I use the information
to give raises. This is may raise a cry of outrage among some, but from
my perspective it is essential. I want to tell my best performers I
appreciate them, value them, want them to stay with me. I would love to
give everyone a million dollars, but I have limited resources, so I have
to decide how to invest it. Performance to expectations is key. My
organization's success depends on me keeping the most talented people, and
upgrading the talents of everyone. My process allows me to do that.
However, in the spirit of triage, most of the people learn they are
performing acceptably, pretty much in line with everyone else in the
organization. It also allows me to ensure that pay matches performance,
and everyone with equal performance gets equal pay.
Do I signal the employee to give me biased information? It would be a big
mistake to think their information is anything but biased, regardless of
what I signal them. My perceptions are biased as well. As I said, this
is not a values-free environment. We all have our biases, we all express
them despite our efforts to free ourselves from them. However, I do not
rely only on my perspective or their perspective. I also look to peers,
clients, subordinates, and so forth. This is where I get the most
relevant information. When clients are unhappy, then I know I have a big
problem.
The other thing that is important to know is that this 'formal' process
only occurs once a year, but coaching is ongoing every day. I have yet to
have someone be surprised at their performance rating (they may have
disagreed), because there were no secrets, and they had heard from me
already, many, many times over. Since it is not a one-time event, but a
never-ending process, it is really impossible to hide relevant
information.
Most feedback is pretty much instantaneous, meaning same day. Most
feedback -- more than 95% -- is positive. It's funny how the people on
this list get stuck on the very small numbers who are adversely affected,
and forget to think about the impact on all those who are positively
affected. I am a bit mystified by this bias.
Rol Fessenden
> My question, Rol, would be "Why do you need to go any further
>and actually rank the employees ?" Once you have done this, you have
>done everything, as a manager, you could do to help the employee improve
>his performance according to your expectations.
> If you do the next step of ranking or rating the employee and
>use the rank or the rating for any other purpose (which, in that case I
>assume would be known to the employee) than coaching, don't you signal
>that employee to give you more biased (in his/her favor) or, worst,
>incorrect data onto which you will base your coaching ?
--Rol Fessenden <76234.3636@compuserve.com>
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