"Your Performance Appraisals - Two-Way Street or One-Way Highway"
By Linda Bailey, SPHR

If your employee’s performance appraisal form is completely filled out before your employee walks into their performance appraisal meeting, how much conversation do you think is going to take place? If you are thinking to yourself “probably not much”, you are correct.  If the performance appraisal form is all ready complete, why should your employee bother to talk?!  Your employee is going to assume your opinion is formed and unchangeable because it’s all ready written down, so there is no reason to waste their breathe and time.  This type of appraisal meeting takes about 2½ minutes – the one-way highway approach.  You might say something similar to, “You know you are doing fine – all I need is your signature.”  If there is an issue to discuss, many times it is addressed by a short, one-sided comment like “try to come to work on time more often”, etc.  How much do you and your employee get out of this approach?

 

With some modifications, you can conduct a performance appraisal meeting that will leave both you and your employee feeling like it was worth the time.  It is reasonable to expect your employee to actively participate in their performance appraisal meeting.  Their career should be more important to them than it is to you, their boss.  However, in order to get some candid and thoughtful input from your employees during their appraisal meetings, it’s up to you to create an environment that fosters their interest and participation.  What does that entail?  The right to criticize has to be earned.  Have you earned that right?  What has your relationship been up to this point in time? Do you know anything about them personally?  Have you earned their respect and trust?  Do you have other conversations besides those referring to late schedules or budget overruns?  Have you made notes during the year to ensure accurate comments?  Have you talked about adjustments as they are needed throughout the year so no surprises will occur in the performance appraisal conversation?  All this, and probably more, will be necessary to ensure a worthwhile exchange of information and ideas.

 

After ensuring their working environment is conducive to a candid dialogue, some pre-work is necessary for both parties.  Some organizations suggest a self-assessment process, so you can get an indication of what the employee thinks of their performance.  When performance appraisal time draws near, the employee is given a blank copy of the performance appraisal form to complete on themselves and a date is scheduled for the performance appraisal meeting, usually within 5 – 7 days. While they are completing their form, you, as their boss, are completing your version.  On your scheduled meeting date and time, you get together and compare notes.  I do not recommend receiving the employees’ version before the meeting.  In order to ensure conversation, the employee should be instructed, in advance, they will be going over their version and doing the talking first.  If you talk first, their remarks will probably not be as candid.  Please never use the employee’s version as the final document.  Your employee will resent doing your job for you and will not take the process seriously in the future.  The final document that goes to the personnel file should contain the best combination of both versions.

 

Another approach is to provide your employee with a couple of thought provoking questions they will be expected to discuss when the meeting takes place.  Some examples are:

- What can I or the company do to help you do your job better?

- Do you feel able to use the best of your talents at work? 

- If you could focus on one area where you would like to develop your own skills or gain more experience, what would it be?

Alternating the self-assessment approach with thought provoking questions (which should regularly change) from year to year helps to keep the process from becoming stagnant.

 

Do your absolute best to make sure the performance appraisal meeting takes place at the originally scheduled date and time – the one given to them when they received their self-appraisal form or thought-provoking questions.  Late performance appraisals send a number of negative messages.  Late appraisals will give the impression you don’t care about the performance appraisal process and it isn’t a valuable part of doing business.  Or your employee might jump to the conclusion bad news is coming and you’re avoiding talking about it.  For those organizations proclaiming “Our employees are our greatest asset,” late performance appraisals will make that statement a lie.  If an unavoidable conflict occurs, try to reschedule the new performance appraisal meeting before the original meeting date. And make sure you let the employee know the reason for rescheduling.

 

Remember, a well-executed performance appraisal leaves both parties feeling they have gained something and makes your employee aware of the importance of their contribution to your organization.  This will only occur is there is a 50 – 50 dialogue between you and your employee.  This doesn’t happen naturally! 

 

 

Linda Bailey, SPHR, is a consultant, speaker, trainer and teacher in Human Resource issues facing employers, emphasizing the employer-employee relationship. With a goal of “helping employers from needing employment lawyers”, her expertise covers both crises intervention and continuing management solutions. Linda can be reached at (727) 528-0556 or e-mail at Linda@BaileyCG.com