Ed,
I agree with you that the evaluator is accountable for the poor rating of
someone being evaluated. I also find that where this is made to be true,
and where people are _really_ held accountable for performance, it
dramatically impacts their hiring decisions.
Your request for examples forces some thought. I can only reference my
own experience, and I find that since each relationship is different, the
level of partnership is variable. The process works least well when I
have the feeling that I have to protect a person. The need to protect
interferes greatly with my ability to be a good communicator. I sense the
reverse also happens. If someone feels the need to protect themselves,
that interferes with our ability to be partners. Furthermore, the
hierarchy interferes with the level of honesty required for a true
partnership. In my experience, this can be substantially overcome, but
not universally with everyone. For some, postional power is too big a
psychological tool -- crutch for the supervisor, barrier for the
supervisee -- that it becomes an impediment.
Going back to your example, though, I think those levels of sharing of
goals can be achieved, whether that qualifies as a full partnership or
not. There is trust, there is understanding on both sides that success is
success for both, failure is failure for both. There is no fear of
ambush. These are conditions that can be substantially created by the
supervisor's supervisor if the motivation is there. Too often, the lack
of motivation is the crux of the matter.
The other trap supervisors fall into is the 'accountability' trap. It is
fairly easy to hold someone accountable for achieving some goal. In
straightforward situations, it is easy to provide training so a person has
the skills. However, in most real-life situations, it is not that simple,
and 'training' is not the key to success. It is more like what I
characterize as 'awakening' than training. For example, if someone needs
to learn how to influence, all the training in the world will not help
unless the person 'awakens' to the art form of influencing. You can hold
someone accountable in theory for achieving a goal, but unless they know
how to influence, they have no chance of actually achieving the goal. Now
I am a strong proponent of accountability, but I think you have to think
long and hard about exactly what it is you want someone to be accountable
for. I may want someone to be accountable for certain performance goals,
but if they cannot do that until they learn to influence, then the real
accountability is to learn to influence. If the requirement is to be
assertive, and to value assertiveness, then that becomes the goal. If
these softer skills can be honed, then the performance will come almost
automatically.
So, to answer your question, I believe I know of examples where evaluation
works well, and enhances performance. However, the skills required are
more those of a therapist than those of a business person. And therein
may be the problem.
Ed said,
> My experience was one where I was out there on the limb having it sawed
>off behind me. It is like a friend who used to referee college
>basketball games in Michigan. He was taught that whenever a technical
>foul is given it is the referee's fault for allowing game conditions to
>get out of hand. I think if evaluation was seen as not just 360 degrees
>but a partnership, then it would change the morale of the workforce,
>trust would increase and performance and profitability would go up.
>
>Hey, its great theory. What I want to know is if that is happening
>anywhere? Would the list please share anecdotes of places where
>evaluation works.
--Rol Fessenden
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <rkarash@karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>