Hack:
Killing the Charade Spawned by the Annual Performance Appraisal

Aaron -

You are on the right track. I've actually done this before. Giving people feedback once a year is a waste of time. You should give them instant feedback. Personnel development can be done once a year (or twice a year), but personnel development shouldn't have anything to do with appraisals or salary increases.

Let me suggest one more thing - never put feedback in writing. Putting it in writing doesn't make it easier for people to remember or execute but it does annoy staff that received this feedback unexpectedly. The only value you get by putting it in writing is the ability to use it as justification for firing the employee later. But great leaders should be able to provide so much feedback to their staff that firing is always expected and is handled in such a way that there are no negative consequences.

Aaron-
Your Hack really spoke to me. Annual anything today feels out of sync with the speed of the market and the pace of professional learning. I like your solution. At the same time, if we are to have a forcing mechanism in corporate America to ensure managers are on top of managing and developing our teams /staff, I would much rather a quarterly appraisal process that is lighter and less formal.
Jordan

I agree that more frequent reviewing of performance, and more frequent goal-setting sessions with your staff will produce more value than doing so on an annual basis. I believe this is still a critical function for HR to show leadership on, since performance is a key part of identifying top & weak performers, determining training & development needs, and succession management. If HR could provide a streamlined self-service application for managers to use for setting individual goals and measuring performance against those, it makes this more-frequent evaluation activity easier (such systems do exist, many HR functions are not ready to use them). That would also allow for top-down cascading of corporate goals and objectives for companies who like to manage that way.

One more reason to add to the list of why performance reviews are problematic: they are based on the outmoded idea that performance is one directional. In reality, both the employee and the manager must perform for each other to produce optimal outcomes. In an ideal world, both parties would address issues in real time and give each other frequent feedback. However, we've found there needs to be a catalyst that precipitates frequent checks to see how well both parties' expectations are being met.

Steve,
I have to ask. Why do you feel this planning is a critical function for HR to show leadership on? My perspective is that it doesn’t matter where it comes from - just as long as it happens. But maybe I am wrong? Thoughts? Jordan

Great article to start a discussion.

First, let's assume that the manager is interested in actually managing his/her team and is giving near real-time feedback. If not this whole discussion becomes pointless to me.

The answer to the question how often you give more formal feedback (verbally or in writing) depends on the nature of the work. If the work is mostly project focused, it makes most sense to set individual goals at the beginning of the project and give feedback at the end (you may have to lump smaller projects together or break down very large ones in logical phases). Having a set schedule, e.g. quarterly, does not make sense in this case in my opinion. Same goes for salary adjustments and bonuses. These should be done at the end of the project (or phase). You could do an annual overall personal development plan but then again, why not do this when you discuss the next project. This is when you together decide what project the person will be on and what role he/she will take on.