From Dictatorship to Dialogue: Creating Equitable Performance Management Systems
In most of corporate America, and even more in small businesses, managers have had near-dictatorial powers in conducting performance reviews and doling out raises and promotions.
If you get on the boss’s bad side, or if your boss is biased, you’re screwed, even if your results ought to earn you a top rating or a promotion. This state of affairs introduces inefficiency and injustice into management decisions. In the end, it results in worse outcomes for the organizations these managers lead.
The solution is to create systems that don’t give unilateral decision-making about ratings and promotions to managers. Managers should also be focusing on performance development, informal, forward-looking conversations tied to an intrinsic desire on both the part of the boss and employee to improve, grow, and succeed.
When checks and balances limit the power of individual bosses to control these processes unilaterally, the results tend to be much fairer and more reasonable. You’re likelier to wind up with the right people in the right roles.
Rather than allowing managers to write a unilateral performance review, try instituting a 360 process so that people’s performance is assessed by their peers as well as others above and below them in the hierarchy. Create a ratings calibration process that makes sure managers are not easy or hard graders.
How to Address Performance Issues
Sometimes, despite regular performance development conversations, someone might be struggling in their role. When this happens, a manager might implement a performance improvement plan as part of the performance management process.
If legitimate performance issues are identified, take the time to get advice from your boss, to calibrate with your peers (if appropriate), and to get help from HR. Don’t take the attitude that this is your decision alone.
You don’t want to fire a person out of anger, and you don’t want to fail to fire a person out of denial. Many people get lost in their own heads around this highly charged issue; your boss and your peers can help you think more clearly.
Good HR people can not only help you think more clearly but also make sure you do it in a way that won’t get you or the company sued. In an ideal world, your company has somebody in HR whose job it is to help you document properly. (If you run a company, identify such a person!)
If that is not the case, find an employment lawyer or a seasoned HR person or an experienced manager and ask them for help. Don’t just ask for advice; get them to edit what you write. Advice is far too abstract. I’ve seen dozens of cases where a manager has been advised how to write a Performance Improvement Plan (PIP).
They are told to make it fair but not too easy, to make sure that it really addresses the performance issue. The managers hear the “fair” part but ignore the “not too easy” part. The person passes the PIP without addressing the core issue, and the performance problem drags on for another three or six months.
The goal of a PIP is to make sure the employee fully understands the expectations, what they need to do to improve, and what will happen if they don’t.
Find Ways to Show You Care
Radical Candor isn’t just about being clear — it’s about Caring Personally while Challenging Directly. One way to do that in a PIP situation is by helping the employee recognize their strengths and guiding them toward roles that might be a better fit.
When you have to fire people, do it with humility. Remember, the reason you have to fire them is not that they suck. It’s not even that they suck at this job. It’s that this job — the job you gave them — sucks for them.
If possible, point out the skills the employee does well, reinforcing that the issue is role misalignment rather than incompetence. I once had an employee who excelled at process-driven work but struggled in a startup environment that required flexibility.
“You have some really wonderful skills,” I told them. “The problem is that we don’t need those skills right now. Those skills are actually hurting you right now, but there are plenty of places where they would be a tremendous asset.”
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Radical Respect is a weekly newsletter I am publishing on LinkedIn to highlight some of the things that get in the way of creating a collaborative, respectful working environment. A healthy organization is not merely an absence of unpleasant symptoms. Creating a just working environment is about eliminating bad behavior and reinforcing collaborative, respectful behavior. Each week I’ll offer tips on how to do that so you can create a workplace where everyone feels supported and respected. Learn more in my new book Radical Respect, available wherever books are sold! You can also follow Radical Candor® and the Radical Candor Podcast more tips about building better relationships at work.
