Employees Have Opposite Reactions to Performance Review

The days are getting longer, and somehow this means it’s the time of year when a lot of bosses decide it’s high time to review their staff’s performance.  Although workers are reviewed in confidence, plenty of workers compare how their assessments went.  Often, employees come away from performance evaluations with the distinct impression that the process is bogus.

Impact Achievement Group has written a new report called “The Performance Review Process: Facts and Fiction” which uncovers how different members of an organization evaluate the performance review process.

Among the interesting discoveries of the report is the discrepancy between how CEOs and vice presidents and other employees feel about performance review.  People in these top tier positions tend to trust the managers to fairly and accurately conduct performance reviews.  These are the same people who are rarely part of this review process.

Employees who are managed by these same managers are far more critical of their supervisors’ methods of review.

The Impact Achievement Group’s press release describes their findings, “For instance, consider this survey statement: “Our managers and supervisors ensure performance goals and expectations reflect the delivery of results (output) and not activity, effort, and input.” Just over 62 percent of chief executive officers and vice presidents felt that this is often or always true, while only 43 percent of the other group felt the same. This difference of almost 20 percentage points suggests a disconnect for upper-level leaders between the theoretical and the real—how the performance review process is set up to work and how it actually operates.”

Many people may appreciate the Impact Achievement Group distinguishes between the two realities that can operate within an organization.