performance evaluation

The social psychologist Douglas McGregor, best known for his "work motivation theory", wrote: "Traditional performance appraisal methods have been criticized for being considered a personnel method only. This approach simply does not help managers judge their subordinates' personal values and act on those judgments. No manager has or can learn the necessary skills to effectively perform the role of performance appraisal. If performance is fully understood The consequences of evaluation, and few people even accept it."

The critique of performance evaluation that McGregor wrote in the 1950s is still relevant today. While many companies have vastly improved their performance appraisal systems since then, most do not grasp the deeper meaning behind McGregor's critique. The problem isn't just that companies have adopted a hierarchical, top-down approach to evaluation, it's that they don't involve those being evaluated in the definition of evaluation criteria and the design of the evaluation process, and they don't involve employees There is also no assurance that their assessments are being made in an equal, cooperative and mutually supportive manner when it comes to reviewing how they met the assessment criteria.

McGregor believes that no one has the right or ability to evaluate others. And, when you're trying to force people to change, performance reviews inevitably backfire. Telling people what to do is far better than inviting them to be active participants in evaluating their own behavior, helping them figure out how they can improve, and motivating them to improve themselves.

The sole purpose of the evaluation should be to improve the performance of the employee. This means that every employee in the company must be responsible for selecting the criteria for evaluation, defining the evaluation process, maintaining evaluation records, tracking the progress of performance, and achieving performance goals; it means inviting full employee participation and disclosing evaluations clearly The goals and values orientation of the process so that everyone has a clear idea of the potential use of the information they provide. If an evaluation is used to support decisions about employee placement or compensation, or to support the implementation or elimination of systems, it should be conducted separately from performance evaluations focused on improving employee performance. Failure to fully understand the goals and value orientation of the evaluation process can lead to less effective evaluations, as employees may hide or hide mistakes rather than admit them.

All performance evaluations are based on certain values. Values reflect your priorities, emphasize what you care about, and define what people should do. They are about ways of reconciling behavior and ideals, integrating theory and practice.

If evaluation criteria are established without employee participation, imposed without discussion, explained bureaucratically, enforced by superiors, and blindly acquiesced by subordinates, then employees are not evaluated on the basis of what they agree with values, they will feel inferior and lose the motivation to change.

In contrast, if these values are articulated through employee engagement, evaluation criteria are discussed and agreed upon, interpretation of the criteria is flexible, and employees are encouraged to evaluate each other, all participants will Feeling better about yourself will support such an evaluation process and actively seek change, all because the results of the evaluation reflect the shared values, ideals and standards of the employees.

Value Orientation: You Get What You Evaluate

Participatory evaluations link employee performance analysis to explicit values that employees endorse. These values include listening to customers, pursuing great service, working as a team, or going all out to follow up.

After this analysis, people can identify the gap between theoretical values and practical values, and reach a consensus on this. On this basis, improve employee performance by answering some preliminary questions. These questions include: What are your values? How are they applied to your work? How do you know if you are successfully applying them? Is there a gap between the values you believe in and your actual behavior? Is the effect you get consistent with your intent? Questions like these enable employees to increase their own awareness and credibility, thereby bridging the gap between the declaration and implementation of values.

What and how you evaluate will determine the results you get. For example, in a recent study, some volunteers were asked to do a simple task and were told that both quality and quantity were important factors in their final assessment. However, participants could observe whether their raters were measuring the quality or quantity of their work as they completed the task. The researchers found that when participants believed that the evaluators were only measuring quality, the quantity of their work decreased, and when they believed that the evaluators were measuring quantity, the quality decreased.

So it's important for companies not just to dictate what to evaluate, but to actually take action to evaluate what they really want. This means shifting the focus from meeting minimum standards to achieving maximum, unique individual, team and company goals.

In participatory performance evaluation, the evaluator needs to respect the dignity of each person being evaluated, meet their intellectual, social and physical needs, fully support their learning, and organizationally support them to surpass themselves. Evaluators should view performance appraisal as a process that encourages lifelong learning and a strategy for change, not a pointless bureaucratic walkthrough.

As an example, consider the CEO of a small company, annoyed that his leadership team was not able to scale the business and generate revenue. In his view, the team was neither developing customers nor selling the business. In assessing the performance of the leadership team members, he said they were doing poorly and asked them to bring in more business or be fired. Instead of inviting them to participate in the problem-solving, he tries to make them compliant by making them feel ashamed. As a result, members of the team became demoralized, withdrawn, and refused to make any changes in their work.

A consultant outside the company suggested to the CEO that the leadership team conduct its own participatory assessment, answering questions such as: What are we doing successfully? Why can't we do business? How do we determine the direction of our efforts? What should we do to improve profitability? The team's active participation in the evaluation process has shifted from rejecting change to now unanimously supporting the new initiative. They all share performance weaknesses and contribution potential, establish strategies to support each other, target new clients, plan work, and work together to achieve results.

Evaluation Process: Employees and Facilitators Working Together

For most companies, reviewing and reinventing old evaluation processes is the best way to start designing participatory performance evaluation systems. This may mean interviewing employees, hiring consultants, or holding focus group meetings to discover why legacy assessment systems are failing, what information is overlooked when using traditional assessment processes, and how to redesign the entire assessment process to be necessary for success information and use it strategically.

Any evaluation system designed by employees to evaluate their own performance is considered fairer and more accurate than a system designed by managers to evaluate subordinates. Therefore, every employee, especially those with questionable performance, should actively participate in the redesign of the evaluation process. They should agree on a single set of values, principles, and evaluation metrics that apply to everyone.

The following are the steps in participatory performance evaluation, through which employees start with the establishment of original goals, to clarify their own capabilities, and finally go all out to achieve the goals:

The first step is to have the Established success practices that define actionable standards and goals for personal development, performance improvement, and co-worker-customer relationships—these success practices clearly define the skills required at each performance level. An assessment facilitator or coordinator is then assigned to provide feedback on these criteria and goals, and to suggest changes, improvements, or additions. These suggestions may be accepted, modified or even rejected by employees. If the employee refuses, the facilitator has to revert to a different approach, such as active listening or conflict resolution.

As a second step, ensure that staff and facilitators agree on the issues to be addressed and assessed, and seek feedback from colleagues together.

In the third step, have the facilitator and employee analyze the results of the feedback and agree on their main conclusions. If differences, contradictions, and unresolvable problems arise, they should work closely together to explore, master, and resolve them.

In the fourth step, let employees identify their strengths and weaknesses based on the assessment results. The facilitators then provide feedback on these strengths and weaknesses, and make suggestions on employee training programs, coaching, coaching, etc., to help employees improve performance.

In Step 5, the facilitator and the employee should agree on what the employee needs to do to improve the competencies required in each assessment area and what the facilitator needs to do to ensure that specific and effective support is provided to the employee on an ongoing basis.

As a final step, ensure that the facilitator and staff review the consensus they have reached, and then work hard to achieve it. Let them set timelines and benchmarks, and agree to meet regularly to check on progress. Together, they should determine what and how to communicate results with team members and internal customers, and they should provide feedback to each other on their respective roles in the evaluation process for improvement.

Assessment method: 360-degree assessments are favored

All performance assessments are influenced and misled by the experience and background of the assessor. Therefore, the most effective, fair and impartial method of evaluating employee performance is a comprehensive 360-degree evaluation. The 360-degree assessment includes the following:

Self-Assessment. All employees honestly evaluate their own performance.

Team or peer assessment. All team members or colleagues pay attention to what a team member should do to improve performance.

Vertical evaluation. The manager evaluates his subordinates, and similarly, the manager is also evaluated by the subordinates accordingly.

Customer Evaluation. Each department asks its internal customers (and sometimes external customers) to evaluate what is working and what is not working for the department, and what should be done to improve it.

The 360-degree assessment process has many goals, including: capturing and communicating an employee's overall performance status; encouraging employees, teams, and departments to learn, experiment, and improve their performance; and increase the company's enthusiasm for learning and adaptability encourages dialogue across the company, advocates responsibility for improving performance, encourages proactive preventive measures, and promotes cooperative problem solving; implements the focus of performance on customer needs and expectations; guides employees in the company to engage in participatory Evaluation is seen as an integral part of the company's values and culture, not just an embellishment.

The real purpose of the 360-degree assessment process is not just to gather information, but to compare and integrate various data from different perspectives in order to gain richer and deeper information from the process. This awareness can lead to deeper and face-to-face conversations, leading to teamwork, or the initiation of coaching initiatives to solve problems.

A key outcome of this evaluation process was consensus on the main aspects of the evaluation and steps to improve performance in each area. To achieve such results, the assessment tools need to be simplified and the assessment process short. For example, one company has worked collectively to establish general performance standards, and the following are some of those standards:

Task or Technical Capability: The level of skill at which a given task can be accomplished.

Adaptability, improvisation and initiative: adapting to new challenges, discovering resources, or actively using one's judgment without waiting for specific instructions.

Accountability and Reliability: Taking responsibility and adhering to obligations to ensure that work is done correctly.

Relationship Building and Process Skills: Working with others in a team manner helps them work more effectively together.

Respect Others: Respect and live in peace with others.

Communication, negotiation and conflict resolution skills: communicate clearly and effectively, negotiate collectively, and resolve conflicts among colleagues.

Leadership and Coaching Skills: Be a good leader and help others become competent leaders.

The value of these criteria is that they define few, and therefore can be mastered, skills that are the focus of the participatory assessment process. Of course, this list of skills can be lengthened under the principle of "graspable". By tightly targeting specific skills, the performance review process is not only less time-consuming but more pragmatic.

Punishment and dismissal: a heart-to-heart choice

If participatory performance reviews do not lead to improvement, and the employee's performance is not improving, the next step may be to initiate another evaluation process. Although this process may result in punishment or dismissal of employees. This failure may be attributed to insufficient participation. Reasons may be that performance goals are set too high, training is insufficient, or performance expectations are not clear enough or communicated poorly. This may mean that the employee is not suitable for the current job, or does not have the skills to meet the needs of the job, or has given up and chose not to make progress; it may also mean that the manager cannot eliminate the employee's defensive psychology, or the employee Frustrated by unresolved conflicts with colleagues. There may even be hundreds of reasons for failure, none of which is directly related to the employee's ability to do their jobs satisfactorily.

In order to deal with these weaknesses, it may be necessary to resort to punishment or expulsion. The first step is self-criticism by those responsible for the punishment, asking whether they really did what they were supposed to do. They need to check whether they have communicated effectively with employees, whether they have given deep and sincere feedback to employees, and whether they have listened to their problems bravely. Are they treating an employee's behavior in a supportive manner? Is it figuring out exactly what is not working? Does it completely solve the underlying problem?

Unfortunately, managers who penalize rarely engage in heart-to-heart communication with underperforming employees. This causes them to spend more time, energy and resources punishing or outright firing employees than the time, energy and resources spent on finding and correcting what's wrong, and investing in future learning and development less.

As a result, even though employees have been warned by the company for years for just passing or failing performance, they are still shocked that they are being punished or fired. The fact that they have been underperforming for years may have given them the illusion that underperforming can still continue and that management has tacitly agreed that they can maintain the status quo.

Many managers are hesitant or vague when it comes to punishment for fear of resistance from their employees. The result of this is that they blind their employees from finally realizing that their performance was unacceptable and making the choice to improve it or quit.

To encourage organizational learning, those who have the power to decide whether to punish or fire an employee should conduct extensive interviews with the employee and carefully investigate the truth of all the employee's claims and defenses. They should investigate why the employee was hired for the first job, and scrutinize the specific reasons why performance feedback is so difficult to reverse poor performance.

Many employees fired for poor performance probably shouldn't have been hired at all, while others were simply not successful because of managers, or company policy constraints that hurt their ability to do their best to the spirit of going. Exit interviews allow companies to identify sticking points and improve their internal processes.

To wake people up from traditional performance appraisal methods and embrace management practices of participatory performance appraisal and feedback based on the assumption that individual and organizational learning can be achieved through open and honest communication, teamwork Relationships and participation throughout the performance improvement process are strengthened.

Copyright registered by People's Posts and Telecommunications Publishing House in 2004. Translated by Zhang Ping.
By Kenneth Cloke, director of the Center for Dispute Resolution, a coordinator, consultant, and trainer; and author, Joan Goldsmith, an organizational consultant, coach, and educator in the areas of leadership development and organizational change. The two authors have co-authored five notable books, including The End of Management and Rise of Organizational Democracy, among others.

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Do you really understand the evaluation criteria?

In the participatory performance evaluation process, the boss directly tells employees what they must achieve in order to be successful; What are the consequences.

The following questions can be used to test employees' awareness of organizational standards and the consequences of their failure to meet them:

● If you are a manager of a company, what performance or what do you expect your employees to achieve? level of behavior?

● Do you think companies have a right to expect minimum standards from their employees?

● What are the standards you endorse? Do you think the current standard needs to be revised?

● Would you be interested in learning more about what those standards were or why they were set?

● What impact do you think the failure to meet will have on the team? What about the impact on the company?

● What do you think will be the consequences of the employee's failure to meet the standards?

● If you are a manager, how many times do you warn employees who do not meet standards?

● If you continued at your current level of performance, what do you think you would face?

● Do you believe you have met these standards? How do we test to know for sure if you meet these standards?

● What kind of support do you feel you need in order to meet these standards?

● Are you sure you really need this job? Have you ever thought that this position might not really be right for you?

● If you really want the job, how are you going to keep it?

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