Periodically, I come across yet another article calling for the “death” of the performance appraisal. I am starting to look at these sort of like the recent spate of death hoaxes on Twitter; they get a lot of media play, but there’s not a lot of credibility.

I’ve written in the past about pay for performance and the value it has within organizations. I’ve seen firsthand with our customers what these programs can do when they are managed as part of a larger, cohesive talent management program. Recently I read an article from Corporate Executive Board that shares ways for organizations to reward employees beyond the bonus. As the article explains:

Hitting the numbers – preserving margin, customer loyalty and growing revenue – are top of mind for CEOs in this economy. What will top teams do to manage talent to achieve these goals? How will HR leaders support these operational and financial concerns? All of these areas will be explored in an upcoming HCI webinar with Edwin Boswell, CEO at The Forum Corporation and Scott Mottern, Director of HR at Convenience Food Systems. The webinar will take place on April 21st from 3 to 4 pm EDT.

Here’s a guest post I did over at Fistful of Talent a couple weeks ago. It received quite a few comments, which can be expected around such a hotly debated subject such as stacked ranking. I’d love to have your comments below.

I’ve recently read a few different items about executives and upper level management and how they need to be part of the appraisal and employee development process. I was bit surprised when I read them, because I assumed that this was a bit of a no-brainer. If you want to drive employee engagement, executive participation in the process is critical. I’m sure most, if not all HR pros would agree, but apparently there’s a breakdown in some organization’s executive teams when it comes to understanding this link.