BY C.V. “BUDDY” MARTINETTE
There is always apprehension around performance evaluation time-that special rite of passage where a supervisor and an employee have the opportunity to discuss successes and challenges. Or, from a more cynical perspective, the supervisor sits in judgment of subordinate employees and tells them something they already know or something they surely don’t want to hear.
As seen by the employee, these sessions can mean the difference between a bright and fulfilling career and suddenly standing in the unemployment line. At the very least, they are unsettling events for everyone involved.
Conventional wisdom holds that if your performance was satisfactory during the past year you will get whatever amount of raise or merit increase is approved in the budget. Likewise, if your performance was unsatisfactory, you would not be eligible for the increase-something that doesn’t happen very often, I might add. In fact, less than 1 percent of our city’s workforce is rated ineligible for an increase based on performance.
Performance reviews are sometimes used in promotional processes to determine the candidate’s ability to perform at the next level. How do you think they usually go? Let’s see, a supervisor needs to comment and report that someone he works with on a daily basis is either fit for promotion or not. Chances are the supervisor understands what is at stake for the employee and gives him higher than deserved marks.
That said, there is generally a lot on the line when it comes to our success and the performance review we are given by our superiors-professionally for the organization and personally for ourselves.
Make no mistake about it, correctly preparing, documenting, and conducting performance reviews take hard work. It is hard because many of us don’t have the training or expertise to do evaluations correctly, nor do we understand the true nature of what the evaluation should be doing for the employee and the organization. It is also very uncomfortable for most of us to sit in formal judgment of another person, regardless of the relationship.
TYPICAL EMPLOYEE EVALUATIONS
Most of the time, evaluations end up being one person’s opinion of how another employee, usually a subordinate, performs based on a series of listed traits and behaviors. In situations where there is disagreement between the supervisor’s observations and the employee’s feelings, the process usually has the unintended consequence of becoming confrontational, cynical, and degrading for the employee. It is also usually just as hard for the supervisor to conduct the meeting as it is frustrating for the employee to sit through it.
Typical evaluations have questions in them that require someone to say to what extent another person works hard, looks good, has integrity, doesn’t violate policy, cares about customer service, stays fit, or any number of otherwise meaningless trait-based observations dealing with someone’s work behavior.
Now before you go off the deep end, I did not say that these things aren’t important at some level. Certainly, looking professional, being physically fit, and these other behaviors and traits are important to organizational success. My question to all of you who have to do evaluations is this: Why do you have to wait for a performance review to come along before telling employees they look good? And for that matter, do you think that the person who looks good wants to sit across from you and hear that you think he looks good? Do you think that great employees who work all year and don’t violate policy want to hear at a meeting with you that you appreciate their doing what they were told is a core value of the organization when they were hired?
Please don’t think I am advocating that employees can act any way they want and not be held accountable. Behavioral standards should be self-monitored and also monitored by officers, based on departmental values. Frequently, departments have values that are supposed to be a guide for behavior. At the very least, I think most of us can describe appropriate behavior.
The members of Lynchburg (VA) Fire & EMS use our department vision; purpose; and values of honesty, integrity, compassion, and trust to guide our decision making. If our employees don’t live by these standards, then they shouldn’t be working for the department, and we don’t need an evaluation process to do something about that. Unfortunately, the evaluation period is most often used as the opportune time to convey this message.
One of the problems with most evaluation systems is that we evaluate others based on our opinion of their behavior. The predominant mechanism used is how they perform based on their supervisor’s opinion, when compared with a predetermined yardstick of numbers and descriptions (or worse yet, how they compare with the other employees under that supervisor’s direction).
Once employees start to recognize that connection between the evaluator and the carrot, they start performing for the evaluator. It signals to the employees that the supervisor’s rating, not the accomplishments used to benefit the organization, is the carrot. The problem here is that you don’t want them to start working for the evaluator’s carrot; you want them working because it is the right thing to do for the organization and their own personal and professional integrity.
WHAT SHOULD EVALUATIONS BE DOING FOR US?
So what is an evaluation supposed to do for us? Shouldn’t an evaluation be an attempt to document what an employee is doing to help the organization accomplish customer service and other goals? Shouldn’t it encourage the employees to become better at their job by identifying goals and objectives that would result in an increased ability to perform their job functions? And perhaps the biggest question of all: Who should own the responsibility for these actions-the supervisor or the employee?
The key to any performance review process may well be in how much preparation a supervisor puts in prior to meeting with the employee. That preparation should start at the beginning of a firefighter’s career. It is very important for all supervisors to understand just how critical it is to have clear expectations outlined at the beginning of someone’s career, new job, promotion, and so on.
Spend time aligning the employee’s expectations with the organization’s goals and vision. Once a strategy for alignment between the employee efforts and the organization direction is accomplished, things should run smoothly because all actions (performance and otherwise) advance the organization’s strategies and mission.
The process of alignment in this case is not as difficult as it might sound. Employees and supervisors get their clues from their immediate supervisor’s stating what they are and from written documents such as the job description or task analysis. Discussing these elements prior to an evaluation and reaching agreement initiate a partnership between the employees and their supervisor.
THE SWITCH FROM JUDGING TO HELPING AND OWNERSHIP
Many progressive leaders understand that an important link to organizational success involves how well they can align their employees with the work that needs to be done. Using that as a postscript, then why would we as leaders not try to concentrate our efforts on how well employees align themselves with work instead of individual behaviors that, when separated, mean nothing?
The evaluation process used by the members in our department attempts to switch ownership for positive results from the supervisor to the employee, recognizing that we all have a responsibility to analyze our own strengths and weaknesses and then determine our own future direction and goals. Likewise, getting to the place we say we need to go is also our responsibility, and not that of our supervisor.
To accomplish this, we started asking our employees to evaluate themselves on how well they achieved their stated goals of the previous year. This is stated as, “Please prepare a brief review, one or two pages, of how you feel you have done this past year in comparison with your established plan. What is the most important achievement in your area of work?”
Then supervisors are asked to articulate how they are going to use their leadership abilities to help advance the members of their workgroup or department toward achieving their stated goals. This is a big switch from a supervisor’s telling employees how they should behave to the employees’ telling the supervisor what they are going to do to help the organization. This aids in solidifying the attitude that as officers our job is to take ownership of helping others get where they want to go. It also puts an end to the perceived notion that it is somehow the officer’s responsibility to ensure that the employees get what they want.
Another important aspect of the review is having the employees tell you how they will demonstrate personal responsibility for their own future. This could not be more critical for aspiring employees, as it lets them know up front that it is not the officer’s responsibility to see that they are promoted or advanced to their desired position. It is the employees’ own efforts that will lead them where they want to go. By having them reduce this to writing, they take the first step toward assuming this responsibility.
Finally, we asked each member to outline key projects and related goals that will advance the department’s work. In this manner, the supervisor can evaluate goal alignment and, if necessary, encourage goals that will benefit the department and the employees.
A final key component in this type of evaluation is the evaluators discussing with the employees how they are willing to help them achieve their stated goals. In all cases, we should understand that although employees must take ownership of their career, it is the supervisor’s job to create the environment in which they stand the best chance of success.
THE FEEDBACK SESSION
When you do get a chance to sit down with an employee to discuss performance, the meeting should very quickly focus on the accomplishments of the past year and the impact the employee has had on advancing the organization’s goals and strategies. Then, and this is the most important part of the feedback session, focus on the future and what the employees want to do to advance the organization and themselves. What brilliant ideas have they been holding back? What unbelievable opportunity do they want to turn into something awesome for the department? What was the worst process they encountered in the past year that they now want to improve?
Let’s face it: We all bring to the table traits and behaviors that in one way or another can be used to advance the organization. The key is using our employees’ best traits and talents while respecting the fact we are all different. Why should the fact that I have better customer service skills than you have anything to do with your evaluation unless the skills have negatively affected our customers?
In the example above, I am not speaking about the rude and obnoxious employee who disregards and disrespects our customers. I am referring to the difference between the 85 percent of the department who have very good skills and the 10 percent who have excellent skills. If 95 percent of the department have above-average customer service skills, why would I spend my time telling them as much? Anyway, these skills mean nothing unless they are used to advance the organization!
WORK PLAN OR EVALUATION?
Using an employee-driven process ends up being a combination of self-evaluation and proposed work plan. My feeling is that by having employees develop their evaluation/work plan, the responsibility for accomplishment then belongs to the employee and not the supervisor. It just makes sense: The employees are the ones most knowledgeable about their efforts and how they can best help the organization.
To further advance this point, I think people know themselves better than other people know them. I also think people want to be recognized for their achievements, and who knows more about an employee’s achievements than the employee? The other positive aspect of this kind of evaluation is that it articulates what the employees want to do with their careers so the supervisor can then help them.
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This evaluation process creates ownership on the part of the employees-it helps them see that they are responsible for their actions, their career, and the success of the organization. It also demonstrates respect for the fact we are all different and can use different traits and behaviors to advance the organization. Finally, it gets away from comparing one person with another as a form of evaluating individual worth.
On a personal note, I conducted this process with our senior staff the past two years. I found it very informative and refreshing to read the reviews. I don’t like judging people’s traits and instead would rather help them get where they want to go, using their best strengths to get there. The other positive aspect of this process is that now I can help them because they told me what they are trying to achieve.
I am sure you will agree that most us have great employees who want to do their best work and become better every day. As evaluators, it is our job to mentor, coach, and guide these employees so they can reach their full potential in their personal and professional lives. So, let’s take a step back from judging people and start a process of change. My feeling is that employees and supervisors will then feel better about the evaluation process. ■
