Employee Performance Evaluation: What You’re Probably Not Doing

How many of your employees can’t wait for their next performance evaluation? Chances are…not many. And those who are pining to be reviewed are likely in a situation where they are hoping to turn their positive performance into reward – in essence, they’re using the review as a justification and acknowledgement of their great work (they’re like the golden retriever employees – they know their great…and hey, I’ll take a treat now).

Check out this article which details effective employee engagement. I think in many ways its right on – and it accurately portrays what successful organizations are likely already doing when evaluating employees. But here’s what it doesn’t say…and what most organizations aren’t doing:

Conducting employee performance evaluations and linking performance management to…wait for it…the actual employees! I’m not talking about abandoning benchmarks or company/dept wide metrics…I’m talking about honing in on performance evaluation in a way that makes sense for each employee.

And that goes to individually understanding employees. Do you expect that an employee with a Conceptual thinking style is going to approach stated goals the same way as a very Structural, process-driven person? Probably not…so why evaluate them the same way? Here’s the key:

• Don’t evaluate the process – different employees are going to get there different ways.
• Provide reachable (yet stretched) goals for each employee – that means a deep discussion around how they work and what will provide satisfaction and business results
• Connect goals and performance to an individualized plan – tie goals to their personality and strengths – not yours or the organization’s.

Think about how these steps can take your employee performance evaluation to a more productive level.

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