Bringing Focus to an Appraisal Conversation

If you do nothing else, do this.

Last week, I started a conversation about performance appraisal. 

In response to the question: “How do I improve my performance evaluation process?”, I would start by asking: “What is your appetite for change?”

If the answer is some form of, “Not very big,” there are a couple of quick-hit answers that can usually move people in a desired direction.

The first thing to work on is focusing the appraisal conversation: What is the message you want to deliver to the person being appraised? To get a handle on that, look at both the results and behavior of this individual. Are they where they need to be? In other words, is this person a consistently solid performer or better?

If that’s the case, you should be preparing a positive message. Most of your people will likely be in this category.

On the other hand, if results or behavior (or both) are lacking, the message needs to be a negative one. As in, “This is what I’ve seen; there are some things that are not at acceptable levels; we need to do something about it.”

No mixing these things. No feedback sandwiches: start with something good, talk about what needs improving, and end with something positive. That approach just muddles the situation. If you feed people the sandwich, your good performers walk away feeling demoralized because they are totally focused on the negative, and those you want to give a stern message hear only the positive and think things aren’t all that bad. Exactly the opposite of what you intend.

None of this is to suggest that we all don’t have development needs, things we can be working on. That’s not what we’re talking about here. Another aspect of focusing the conversation is to have only one conversation at a time.

Because the typical performance evaluation forms and processes take into account so many things (feedback, ratings, compensation, development, coaching, to name a few), supervisors can find themselves at a disadvantage right from the start because they are expected to accomplish so many things at once. Each of these components is important and deserves its own, focused conversation.

If the prescribed process won’t allow for separating the various pieces in time and space, make sure to do so yourself during the single appraisal conversation the process dictates. Do this explicitly. Even if it means taking five minute breaks to mark transitions.

Providing this kind of support to employees is perhaps the most important part of the job of a supervisor or manager. It requires huge time and effort. Do what you can to make sure the interactions at the end achieve the intended results.

The Contribution System and Performance

It really is all about the conversation

Being focused in an conversation with another person is important most anytime, but especially during a performance review. Last time, I wrote about a couple of ways to bring more focus to an appraisal. This next step in the progression begins to move away from traditional configurations of this important institutional process.

Start by considering that an individual’s performance is part of a much larger context, or system. This can seem at cross purposes to the whole point of an appraisal, but I’d like to suggest it is a more realistic and fair way to review performance.

Ask who or what contributed to the results this person achieved. Certainly the appraisee had something to do with the way things turned out, or we wouldn’t be having this conversation in the first place. Looked at closely, however, any outcome or result has multiple contributors. They all need to be considered if what happened is going to be repeated (or avoided).

Too often, performance reviews are about parceling out blame for something that happened. This is unproductive for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that blaming usually elicits defensiveness, strong emotion, interruptions, and arguments. Not exactly the stuff of effective conversations.

Focusing on contribution can make a potentially difficult feedback conversation about performance relatively easier and more likely to be productive.

It does not let the person being reviewed off the hook. The central notion is that a number of factors that led to the outcome we are talking about, and one of these factors was the action (or inaction) of the person being reviewed. If you intend for learning and change to take place, a surer way to get there is by adopting a forward-looking, problem-solving approach to the conversation.

The original meaning of conversation, extending from the 14th century, was the act of living with, or keeping company with. It didn’t pick up the specific sense of “talk” until around 1580. Hence conversation, especially in the sense I am using it with respect to performance appraisal, implies full engagement and commitment by the two parties.

In order to do this most effectively, more frequent, shorter interactions may be helpful. The once-a-year review comes fraught with lots of noise and baggage that can make real conversation very challenging. Increasing the frequency might also lighten the record keeping burden for everyone.

Managing Risk

Organization development as risk management

I had breakfast with a close friend and colleague recently and he got me thinking about risk management. He’s a big data guy for financial services (I’m not doing him justice with that shorthand description), and he asked me about the kind of risks HR executives worry about and whether they might be subject to the type of data analysis he does. We concluded -- for now -- that the data he would need access to wouldn’t be available without a court order. 

Still, I was intrigued by the whole notion of risk management and how it might apply to the work I do with leaders and executive teams. As I understand it, using big data to find and mitigate risk is all about sifting through relevant information and looking for patterns. What is especially interesting about my friend’s work is that he needs to have some idea of what he’s looking for before he even begins. Without that, there is no way to make sense of the information he has collected.

It’s the same with me. The data gathering I do has to have a point. It seems obvious, but I can’t just make random inquiries or start an interview with, “Talk to me”, and expect to learn anything useful.

Often, the questions I ask can lead to the discovery of unexpected patterns and insights, it’s true. But I’d never get to those without the initial framing of the issues or without having some sense of what I needed to be attending to.

The system always shows me what I’m looking for, if it’s in there. If it’s not, I have to look for something else.

The patterns and insights that emerge from this kind of analysis can create an anticipatory frame of mind, as in “Let’s try this now!” They inform the next set of choices facing the leader or team. Now, they are acting from a place of greater knowledge and can feel more confident.

I wonder if I should add “Risk Manager” to my business card….

Leadership and Vulnerability

How are these two things connected?

I have long maintained that vulnerability is a key component of effective leadership. It’s right up there with self-awareness. I’m willing to bet that almost any leader whom you admire has, at some point, displayed his or her vulnerability. Not only that, it is that very display that makes him or her so admirable.

I was doing some research for a talk I’m giving later this month on performance appraisal systems (more on that later), and I came across this set of short videos featuring Brene Brown. I love her work. Perhaps you’ve seen her TED talks. She’s a social science researcher who specializes in vulnerability and shame. Cool, right?

In these brief clips, Brown talks about how her years of research have led her to the conclusion that uncertainty, risk, and emotional exposure are the building blocks of vulnerability. She goes on to make the straightforward connection to leadership: leaders are in the business of dealing with uncertainty, and managing risk and exposure, emotional or otherwise. By definition, then, leaders are required to step up and into what makes them vulnerable.

I thought she put a rather hard edge on what we typically think of as a soft, squishy topic.

What is it about Performance Appraisal?

Such a good idea, and we run it off the rails.

What comes to mind when you think about “performance evaluations?” Or “performance measurement”?

If you’re like most people, what you are thinking of right now is not very pleasant. Performance evaluation ishard to do. Even though it is a fundamental part of a manager’s job, it will never be comfortable or routine. The process is all about judging people, and no amount of streamlining or design is going to change that.

At its core, a performance appraisal is intended to evaluate how a person is doing in her job with a view to helping her improve. This seems like such a beneficial and reasonable idea, especially when creating the conditions for individual improvement lines up with the broader strategic objectives of the organization. Then everybody wins, at least in theory.

Most performance measurement systems try to accomplish multiple tasks, which can lead to confusion if not well understood and skillfully executed. This list often includes:

• Performance feedback
• Inputs to the reward systems (compensation and promotion)
• Review of the appraisee’s potential for professional development
• Documentation for any centralized reporting that HR may do
• Raw material for any coaching the manager may do with the team member

This is a lot to accomplish in a single, yearly interaction, even though there is considerable connectedness among many of these tasks. And then there are things like motivation, counseling, retention, discipline, and firing, all of which can also be loaded into the mix from time to time.

Much has been written about the difficulties with performance appraisal in our organizations, so I am not going to pile on. There are, however, three interrelated obstacles that I see as at the top of the heap: burdensome administrative systems, rater capability, and participant resistance or apathy.

There is a way out of this, and it won’t be easy. So many managers and supervisors, particularly at large institutions, have embedded systems and processes that can’t be shifted. So, starting small is one way to get things going.

What I have in mind is a focus on the conversation. This is the one component that the manager and appraisee can influence to meet their needs.

My posts next week will look at ways to shape the way to talk about performance.