> Yes, and at least a few expectant Mothers were safely driven to the
> hospital in Ford Edsels - an automobile acknowledged as one of the great
> marketing disasters of this century. While good and bad examples of the
> effects of performance appraisals abound, judging the appraisals
> themselves is impossible without putting them in a larger context.
" ... putting them in a larger context." I believe this has precisely been
the point all along of people who have stated that PA systems, as
practiced in their own organizations or in some other organizations they
know, have been good to them, to most of their people, and to their
organization as a whole. These organizations have their own sets of
values and belief systems, their own history and culture, etc. that make
their PA system work for them.
> In your case a better hiring system would have produced the same eventual
> results, i.e., the poor manager would never have been put in charge in the
> first place. I presume from your narrative that the new manager was an
> outside hire, but why didn't his previous PA system catch and identify his
> shortcomings? Are you implying that because a particular appraisal system
> worked in your favor that it is a good thing? Racism works in favor of a
> few people too, but I hardly think that qualifies it as a good policy.
So the hiring process in one organization let in a bad manager.... Why
would it be improper to say that this organization's PA system saved the
day for Carrington and his colleagues, if it really did? The bad hiring
does not necessarily negate the good use the PA system was put to.
I believe the example was simply given to show that "scrapping the PA
system'" may work well for some, but, for Carrington et al., "having a PA
system", like their own, in place in fact worked for them and was a good
thing for them per their experience. Some people with bad experiences with
their PA systems have in so many words labelled the practice of continuing
to use PA systems as being dogmatic and inflexible.Yet, calls for
"scrapping PA systems in organizations", because they didn't work out well
in some, appear to me to be equally susceptible to labels of dogmatism, if
not more so.
PA systems equal racism? Because racism is bad, then PA systems are bad?
This looks like a case of using the "horn effect" in its most extreme
form.
> I agree wholeheartedly that there are plenty of examples of wholesome,
> well tuned performance appraisal systems that have beneficial results.
> However, I think it is the tuning and the wholesomeness, not the intrinsic
> value of appraisals in general, that creates these successes.
PA systems have no "intrinsic" value, as a number in the thread have
repeatedly pointed out. On the other hand, they have variously been
employed as a device to support organizational values. As a device, some
do well. Some do badly. Some are refined. Some are replaced. And they come
in different forms, formal or informal, with documentation or without,
with ratings and without, in whatever form appears best at a given time
and context for an organization. Some organizations may claim that they
are doing well with their PA systems. That's fine. Others claim they are
doing well without any form of appraisal. That's fine too.
I've seen how PA systems could be used for selfish and devious ends. I've
also seen how they could be used for "building people to build
organizations." I've seen PA systems that go through an ongoing process of
improvement. I've seen some PA systems that have apparently outlived their
usefulness and have been completely replaced by new ones.
Unfortunately for me I've never come across an orghanization without any
form of appraisal or review at all. Perhaps this is to my disadvantage.
And it's the reason why I'm keeping my eyes and ears open for such unique
(in my view) organizations. It would be truly instructive for me.
And I guess this is why we are in this discussion list. We all want to
learn about learning and learning organizations. We want to see other
perspectives and to be acquainted with other belief systems. More
importantly, I think, we want to be less and less dogmatic and less and
less inflexible about ways of viewing and "appraising" the world around
us.
A few more cents' worth.
Chuck Gesmundo
Minneapolis, MN
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