Morgan was perplexed, “Okay, so if I set the form aside. And if I buy into the conversation-is-the-relationship. Where do I start?”

“Morgan, let’s go back to purpose. What is the purpose of the performance review in the first place?” I asked.

Morgan held his head in both hands, thinking. So many misconceptions abound on the purpose of a performance review that he was temporarily paralyzed. Finally, he spoke. “The performance review should provide feedback to the team member on their performance.” He stopped, still confused. “But isn’t that what we have been doing all along?”

“Let me change a couple of words in your definition,” I replied. “The performance review should provide meaningful feedback to the team member for the purpose of improving their performance. The feedback has to be meaningful and for the purpose of changing their current behavior to more effective behavior.”

Most current performance appraisal systems provide feedback that is not meaningful and do very little to change behavior. I promised Morgan more tomorrow. -TF

Morgan was hanging with me. He had never considered the conversation-as-relationship in the dynamics between the team member and the manager. We had been working on his performance review process.

“Morgan, it’s not the form from the office supply store. It is the conversation. In fact, think about the form. The form actually works against the conversation. It summarizes the complexities of human behavior into numbers.”

Morgan mounted a defense. “That’s why we have the person rate themselves first and then the manager. That way, if they disagree, the two have something to talk about.”

“Morgan, it is a game of tit for tat. A game. What happens when the manager wins the game?”

“Well, the lower the score, the easier it is to justify a lower adjustment to compensation.”

“And if the team member wins the game?”

Morgan stoppped. At first he wasn’t sure. Finally, he replied, “The team member never wins the game. It’s not how it’s played.”

So, in the long run, what impact does this process have on performance. Is there a better conversation that should be happening between the team member and the manager? -TF

Morgan was finally thinking about purpose. What was the purpose of the performance review in the first place? What was the performance review supposed to accomplish?

“Morgan, what is the most critical factor for both team member performance and team member retention?”

At this point, Morgan was gunshy, he hesitated to respond.

“Let me ask this differently,” I continued. “What is the most critical relationship for both team member performance and team member retention?”

Morgan’s face relaxed. “That’s easy. It’s the relationship between the team member and the manager.”

“Good, now let’s build on that. How important is the conversation between the team member and the manager?”

“Pretty important, I guess,” said Morgan, going tentative on me again.

“Here is why it’s important. The relationship between the team member and the manager is the critical factor for both performance and retention. And the conversation is the relationship.”

What kinds of conversations are happening between your team members and your managers? -TF

Conversation is the relationship described in The Heart Aroused by David Whyte.

Morgan handed me a stack of the files which contained copies of previous performance reviews.

“I see here that you are using a 1-5 scale with 1 = poor and 5 = exceeds expectations.” Morgan nodded. I continued, “Scanning down the list, I see that you have tons of 3s and only an occasional 2 or a 4, never a 1 or a 5.”

“That’s easy to understand,” said Morgan. “We don’t have to explain a score of 3. If we rate a 2 or a 4, we have to provide a written explanation. And even if someone deserves a 5, we never give it, because then they might ask for a raise.”

“And, tell me again, what is the purpose of this review?”

“Well, our HR person says that if we have to fire someone, we need to have a bunch of 1s and 2s in the file. Something about avoiding wrongful termination.”

“Morgan, have you ever been up against a labor attorney in court?”

“Not really,” Morgan replied.

“Morgan, have you ever had to explain to an attorney exactly what a 2 means?”

“Not really.”

“Morgan, with all due respect, this little form is not going to get you very far in a wrongful termination suit. There has to be a better purpose for this performance review process.” -TF

I let Morgan puzzle for a while. I had just questioned the Holy Grail of management processes, the annual performance review.

Finally, I broke the silence. “Tell, me, do you really look forward to this annual tennis match all based around this form you bought at the office supply store?”

Morgan had begrudgingly conducted performance reviews for 15 years. He had never considered that this process might be counter-productive to performance.

“Not really,” he replied. “I just thought it came with the territory of being a manager.”

“You are right, it does come with the territory, but I want you to think about a whole new way of conducting this conversation.” -TF

“I can’t believe this list. Look at this. I have 14 performance reviews I have to conduct in the next three weeks. And I just used the last form off of the pad this morning, so I have to send someone out to the office supply store to pick up some more. I wonder if all this is worth it?” lamented Morgan.

“What would Dr. Deming say?” I continued, answering my own question, “I believe Dr. Deming would say, NO. In his research related to TQM, he found no real correlation between performance reviews and productivity. Sometimes, I wonder if performance reviews don’t work against the intentions of a performance feedback loop.”

Morgan was puzzled. The last thing he thought he would hear from me was that I might question the entire performance review process. -TF

“Let me see the projects that you put in for review,” I said, as Sean handed over the list. I scanned down the page, “I see you selected six, tell me, how did you decide which ones for the group to do a post mortem on?”

Each quarter, Sean’s team spent four hours going over significant projects for the quarter, looking for lessons learned. “Oh, that was easy,” Sean replied, “these were the eight biggest money losers.”

It is always tempting to debrief a project where things have gone wrong. Once you have corrected all those problems, where are you? My guess is, you are back to even steven. No loss, no gain, no harm, no foul.

If you really want to make progress, you also have to analyze where things went right. Pick two or three winning projects to debrief. Find out why you were able to make significant margins. Where was the advantage in those projects? Where can you find more projects like those? -TF

“We seem to get so many customer complaints that I feel like I am just putting out fires all day. I am afraid to take time off. Thank goodness we shut the phones down on Sunday,” lamented Bryan.

The reason we create customer service departments is to deal with customer complaints. If you are in business, you will get complaints from customers.

Have everyone in the customer service department meet ten minutes early and make a list of all the complaints from the day before. Next, from the customer perspective, rank them from bad to worse.

1. The delivery was ten minutes late.
2. The delivery was one hour late.
3. The delivery was two hours late.
4. The delivery never arrived.
5. The wrong item was delivered and customer had to return item.
6. The item was delivered damaged and the customer had to file a claim.

The next day, repeat the process and co-mingle the priorities from bad to worse. The pattern created is what Michael Basch (former Federal Express guy) calls the “Hierarchy of Horrors.” With this patterned list, you can now systematically make improvements in the areas that require the most attention. This list is valuable for management meetings where other departments might be able to help.

Make your list. What is your customer’s “Hierarchy of Horrors?” -TF

“I told him he needed to pay more attention to the quality of his work.” Henry was describing a conversation from the day before. “He actually started yelling back at me, right there in front of everyone. We weren’t toe to toe, but we were close.”

At some time, with some people, it doesn’t take much to make that person feel like they have their back against the wall. Here is the bad news. When someone feels that way, they have only three choices, none of which are positive. Fight, flight or paralysis.

As a manager, you still have to provide corrective feedback, but you have to find a different way. Here is one. Talk about your own mistakes first. At some time, in your work experience, you made a similar mistake or created a similar quality problem. Talking about your own mistake first, allows you to explore the details of how and why. This approach should open the other person to talk more about what may be causing their own underperformance. This underlying cause is the issue that has to be resolved for the work quality to improve.

Talk about your own mistakes first. -TF