Performance Reviews: Reports of My Death Have Been Greatly Exaggerated

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.

The most recent article I read calling for companies to scrap annual reviews, was on MSNBC and based on the recently published book “Get Rid of the Performance Review!” by Samuel Culbert, a professor of management at UCLA. While I’ve not read the book, based on everything I’ve heard and seen from Culbert, he is not so much calling for the death of the review, but rather the death of BAD reviews. You know, the kind that are a once a year deal where employees end up frustrated and demoralized. As the article explains:

Companies administer the reviews because they feel they have no alternative for measuring an employee’s performance, Culbert said. He suggests employers should instead have “performance previews,” which would encourage dialogue and also hold management responsible for productivity.

The example of performance appraisals given by Culbert is far from the talent management model we regularly discuss here, which puts performance management at the core of other key talent management programs like succession planning, compensation, and development. Companies that currently have a holistic model in place are using it to drive business results. Companies that continue to deliver appraisals in the manner outlined by Culbert definitely need to reconsider their approach.

So more than writing an obituary, Culbert is advocating for a model based on coaching. Something we’ve discussed plenty here as a critical component of effective performance management

I urge you to take the yearly death calls for appraisals with a grain of salt. Rather ask yourself if you’re doing the right things to make your review process part of ongoing meaningful talent management. That’s the more important question.