Empathy Evolution
The nature of traditional performance management is to assume that everyone is equal and that time doesn't exist. It is what pops out of neo-classical economics.This means that two employees given the same goal are judged on their results. Carrot and stick mechanisms are implemented at various levels of sophistication in an attempt to optimize performance. Unfortunately life isn't like that. Everyone is different and they are not the same from one point in time to another. Rather than accept this as a reality business and society in general spend as an inordinate amount of time trying to make things "fair" to rationalize their judgements as having some validity. Rules are made, laws are enacted and systems are implemented to try to level the playing field. In the process, wisdom is lost.
Alain de Botton spoke at TED http://www.ted.com/talks/alain_de_botton_a_kinder_gentler_philosophy_of_success.html suggested that we should strive to be fair but realize that we will never achieve it.
To model this sentiment, we need a system which progressively expands ones ability to step into another's shoes, to empathise and understand the constraints that a colleague may have at a given time (that you don't currently experience) Hopefully this will take us some way to evaluating true performance and in turn lead to a better form of communication relating to results.
To create a system that measures actions that can be used to assess progress in empathy is difficult.
Obviously a benchmark of where an organization is at present is necessary to gauge how you are going.
Perhaps benchmarking against the following may be a place to start.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=wktlwCPDd94
Greg,
Fully supported!
You would probably agree that there is also a lot of other things that goes into Performance Management. Bringing your proposed mindset into these, what could the implications be?
Thanks,
Bjarte
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@Bjartes,
Organizations are by nature reluctant to change.
I for one recognize the wisdom in the following quote:
“You (never) change the existing reality by fighting it. Instead, create a new model that makes the old one obsolete.” ~ R. Buckminster Fuller
Consequently, the system I speak of, will necessarily be an adjunct to current performance management systems. At least initially. As time moves forward, and organizational cultures evolve as a consequence of its implementation, certain aspects of performance management will evolve as well. Some, will indeed become extinct.
To predict which elements of performance management will go this way, or to state a desire to kill off one or other aspect, is counter-productive to getting buy in on the new system's implementation.
The "adjunct system" must have both tangible and intangible positive return on investment from the get go and be sold into the organization as such.
One might say that it is unknown in which way that an organization is going to evolve as a result of a new systems implementation, but given the basis of its design stems from a higher purpose, "Empathy", that it is highly likely to evolve positively.
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