Employee Ranking Systems LO17234

T.J. Elliott (tjell@IDT.NET)
Sat, 28 Feb 1998 07:06:32 -0800

Replying to LO17174 --

Roxanne Abbas wrote:
> > Rol says:
> > "Sure, but are people upset with the system, or with the way it is being
> > applied by the manager? This has been my point right from the
> > beginning. The tool is fine, but is being misused."
>
> Rol, this may be the most important issue where your perspective differs
> from that of many others who are trying to convey that the tools called
> performance ranking and performance rating are destructive tools that
> should be discarded. It is not simply a matter of training managers to
> use the tool more effectively. I believe that you are so convinced > that
> you are "right" on this issue, that you have been unable to learn from > the
> papers written by Robert Bacal and Fred Nichols and the many eloquent
> posts on the subject.
>
> Roxanne Abbas

Roxanne & Rol & others,

There is a great deal of creativity in contention. Some of what has
transpired on this thread has fueled a dialectic. Someone trying to
address the issue of performance in his/her company would have gained much
from many of the posts here. For example, they would recognize that there
is a lot of "juice" around the issue. They would gain awareness of and
sensitivity to the pitfalls. They would also absorb some of the ways in
which judgements are difficult to escape in the workplace (or anywhere
else). They might devise as a result of all this the best approach
(synthesis) to performance yet. (I doubt that anyyone could read all the
posts and say that any of the existing opinions or methods is perfect.
Y'all did a good job of poking holes in each others' declarations.)

I believe that it is unfortunate to cast the debate in terms of right and
wrong, blessedly enlightened and stubbornly ignorant. Not only has the
evidence on either side (in my opinion) lacked such weight, the approach
undermines dialogue. ("I have the truth and I can't understand why you're
not getting it.") I post this (with some hesitation) because I think
adopting the viewpoint of this hypothetical person who knew nothing of
perfromance prior to reading this thread allows all participants to step
back and see the value that continues to be created.

All the best,

-- 
T.J. Elliott
Cavanaugh Leahy
http://idt.net/~tjell
914 366-7499


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