My mini-piece for BusinessWeek.com on why performance reviews are a waste of time just went live along with a counter-piece arguing for them by Bob Rogers.
I first blogged about this back in 2008 listing the top 10 reasons why formal annual performance reviews are actively damaging to motivation and happiness at work, including:
- Everyone hates them
- They become an excuse for not talking the rest of the year
- They focus too much on the quantifiable
I argue that formal review meetings are just a crutch for bad managers who can’t figure out how to give their people regular timely constructive feedback on their performance.
What do you think? Do you see performance reviews as an essential tool? Or are they just another annoyance keeping you from doing your job?
My comment is in reference to both this article as well as your older blog post you linked to. As a manager, I agree with a lot of your points about performance reviews. I admit I think a lot of them can be mitigated by doing them “right”/better, but your overall points still ring true to me.
What bothers me is that I think you know all too well that it’s in bad form to propose the existence of a problem without articulating a solution. Even in the older post you linked to, the “solution” is incomplete and left me feeling it I had no idea how to solve this problem you propose. Performance reviews have a lot of positive uses if done right, and I don’t hear you making many constructive insights into how to truly replace them.
What I’m really trying to say is that I’d much appreciate some helpful suggestions on exactly how to fully replace performance reviews without losing most of the benefits they offer.