It's appraisal time again!
You can almost feel the glow of excitement of everyone around you on the morning commute to the office. You can almost hear their unspoken wish: 'I do hope I get told my appraisal date today. I can't wait to hear!'
You can pinpoint those whose day has come. They are the ones with the palpable inner glow and the radiant smile that almost lights up the bus or the railway carriage.
Ah! If only every day was appraisal day!
But what is this I hear? You are telling me to return to the real world, where over half the employees — both managers and their direct reports — dislike appraisals? The world where most people are disengaged and a large percentage resign because of their bosses.
If this is so, why do companies have this annual event? Is it just to determine what kind of increment they will get?
You say that there is no connection between the appraisal and salary awards? So this means all the effort I have put in to streamline what I do to achieve greater throughput does not reflect in the value I receive and therefore, if I hadn't bothered, I would get exactly the same increment or recognition?
Oh? It is also to help you plan my developmental needs? So if we find my performance is lacking in February, it will be pinpointed in December so I can receive the appropriate training in the following June? Very helpful.
Besides this, how can an effective and objective assessment of my performance take place when so much of what I have done (or not done) over the past year will have been forgotten anyway? The fact that my current manager took over his position two months after I had done that streamlining and was therefore unaware of my real value-add wasn't helpful either.
It all seems rather arbitrary to me.
Why don't many more companies stop doing what has always been done and instead focus on the things that create a culture in which people enjoy producing great results and in which appraisals are a positive experience for all?
So let's get people smiling in anticipation of not only their appraisals but also their everyday work. It can be done. It has been done.
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