Don’t Bail Out – Make Performance Reviews Count

The New Year is upon us. For many businesses, it’s the season for performance evaluations. Throughout my career, I’ve reviewed performance evaluations in many organizations. These have had various formats, but they often share two common characteristics – they are vague and dishonest.
Sorry to indict managers, but who else is there to blame? Managers are clearly responsible for the vagueness and dishonesty of performance evaluations, and the resultant collateral damage to their organizations.
Some of the vagueness is rooted in fuzzy thinking about job functions. Commonly used words like analyzing, coordinating, assisting and supporting are lazy verbs, describing generic activities that don’t relate to concrete results. For example, describing customer service as supporting and assisting customers is one thing. Describing it as answering phones by the third ring, resolving customers’ problems to the customers’ satisfaction the first time, and remaining polite, even if the customer is rude and insulting, is quite another.
Lofty-sounding but vague annual goals are equally bad. Telling someone to optimize departmental productivity, without defining how productivity will be measured and what constitutes “optimum” is a waste of time. How in the world will anyone know when the goal has been achieved? When a manager writes that an employee should make a vague improvement to a vague activity, the result is vagueness to the second power. Anything involving the words “leveraging” or “synergy” moves the vagueness needle off the chart.
Vagueness goes hand-in-hand with dishonesty. Many managers don’t like confrontation. So instead of being honest with people about competence, performance and behavior, they dance around the issues. Lengthy paragraphs are written, filled with luke-warm praise and irrelevant information, in order to camouflage murky suggestions that some kind of improvements might be in order.
I’ve seen this in my corporate experiences and as a consultant. I’ve had countless opportunities to counsel managers with under-performing employees, and I’ve inherited my share. Nine times out of ten, recent written evaluations give little hint of problems and offer no resolution. Employees who lack competence or accountability, or, who are unable to interact productively with other people, are given middle-of-the-road ratings and passed along with a few vague words about improvement.
This approach helps no one. The employee doesn’t learn anything, the manager is stuck with the problem and other coworkers and the organization suffer. Managers have a responsibility to be totally honest in employee evaluations. They should not hold back on praise where it is due. That’s the easy part. They must also do the hard part and be explicit when employees are not meeting expectations. They must describe exactly what the employee must do to resolve the issue and they must be clear about consequences.
Regardless of the format of the evaluation an organization uses, managers should examine five key questions about each employee:
Does this person demonstrate support of the values and mission of this organization? This is the most fundamental question. If not, one must question why the person is employed. Those who don’t pass this test should be reoriented or helped to find success elsewhere.
Is this person competent in all aspects of this job? If the answer is less than a resounding “yes,” the employee must be informed and a written improvement plan is needed. This plan should require successful completion of training or developmental assignments by specific dates with regular progress reviews. People who are not fully competent are a burden to coworkers and managers, who must constantly fill the gaps. Fortunately, skills can usually be learned once the need is identified.
Is this person responsible and accountable? This covers a lot of ground; everything from coming to work on time to accepting tough assignments. Competent employees who are responsible and accountable generally don’t need much supervision. People who need a baby sitter fail this test and need an improvement plan, in this case leading to a noticeable and sustained change in behavior. The plan should include specific changes needed, dates for progress reviews and specific consequences. Those who fail this test and are not challenged are free-riders who damage management’s authority and credibility.
Does this person have a positive effect on coworkers, teammates and customers? People who can’t get along with others, who are all about themselves or their department, who are passive-aggressive, manipulative or intimidating are problems that management must confront head-on. They should be given one not-very-long chance to demonstrate change.
Does this person have growth potential? This is the question that addresses the future. Sometimes there is no growth in the cards. When there is, managers should work just as hard to help these employees with training and special assignments as they do to help under-performers with improvements.
Honest answers to these questions should help managers and employees to see where employees are shining and where they need help.

Originally published in the Central Penn Business Journal, January 2011
Contact the author at info@newleveladvisors.com

What can businesses learn from the armed forces about building a great team?

Reports state that the air-traffic controller handling the small plane that collided with a helicopter over the Hudson River on Aug. 8 was simultaneously “bantering” on the phone about a dead cat on the taxiway. I wondered why someone with responsibility for others’ lives would engage in such foolishness. I’m sure we will hear some official lamenting, “We can’t get good people,” especially if the controller was young. Maybe we’ll hear, “We aren’t paying enough to get the best people.” Those are pretty good stock excuses. But organizations we all know well have figured out how to get results in high-risk jobs with poorly paid young people.

The night before that accident, I was at the Marine Corps Barracks in Washington, D.C., to see the Silent Drill Platoon. The platoon performs intricate marching maneuvers in total silence. The Marines twirl, throw and catch ten-pound M-1 rifles in perfect precision, with no verbal commands or music to help them keep time. The Marine Drum and Bugle Corps marches and plays a concert.

The show is impressive, but most impressive is the youth and esprit de corps of the participants. To me, they are great representatives of more than 2 million men and women in all branches of the military who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan. Those men and women are young, low-paid volunteers who perform at a high level under extreme conditions and at great personal risk.

There are more examples. The PBS documentary “Carrier” recently spotlighted the young men and women who manage the flight decks and fly the aircraft on the USS Nimitz. Sailors barely out of high school orchestrate the movements of $100 million aircraft in a crowded space where one small mistake can be fatal. The New York Times published an article recently about the increased role of women in combat. Several have been decorated for valor under fire.

You can’t pay enough for what these people do. But without paying what it is worth, with combat deployments almost a given, in good times and bad, the services manage to find millions of capable volunteers, taking people from all walks of life and molding them into effective individuals and units. How can that be, and what lessons can we learn about building effective work teams? All branches of the military promote the idea of being part of something special and important; something that’s not for everybody: “The few, the proud, the Marines.” People want to be part of something special, but how often does a business advertise that it is a major accomplishment to make the team?

Each service has a clearly written mission, values and code of conduct. Recruits, trainees and veterans all know exactly what behaviors are expected and the consequences of failure to meet those standards. How many businesses take the time to articulate those things? How many use them for recruitment and for evaluation of all employees? Any organization can create a mission and values and code of conduct. It doesn’t cost a dime. We can’t all be the Marines, but that doesn’t mean our values and missions can’t be special.

Then there is indoctrination and training. The military spends months hammering home those unique values and ensuring recruits gain the skills they need. They constantly stress teamwork. Some don’t make it and are asked to leave. Businesses can’t match that level of training, but really, how much indoctrination and training does the average new hire get today? Most training, in my experience, is on performing tasks, not on values or teamwork. The priority seems to be getting busy hands working quickly, not building a great employee or a great team. When I hear about problem employees from business owners, more often than not the problems are with individual or group behavior.

Finally, there is responsibility. Watching those young people running a carrier flight deck brought home to me how little real responsibility is given to the average young employee. When you set the target low, that’s what you get. Giving younger employees enough responsibility to test them, with supportive supervision, is a great way to engage them and help them grow.

The economy will start turning around and businesses will be hiring again. Now would be a great time for business leaders to think about improvements in the recruitment, indoctrination and training processes and about documenting a compelling mission, values and code of conduct. It’s never too late to indoctrinate existing employees, so perhaps that should be on the agenda too. And when the hiring starts, don’t forget that there are many veterans out there who have great values and esprit de corps, are responsible and know how to be part of a high-performance team.

• Richard Randall is founder and president of management-consulting firm New Level Advisors in Springettsbury Township, York County. E-mail him at info@newleveladvisors.com.

As originally published in the Central Penn Business Journal