Calibrate performance review ratings across your management team
By Joan Lloyd
If you are a manager who takes the responsibility of doing
performance reviews seriously you are probably frustrated with the
process. It’s far from a perfect science but one thing is
certain, if promotions and other career decisions are based in part
on the performance reviews of employees, it’s important that
managers are consistent in how they evaluate employees.
Impossible you say? One way I’ve helped managers get
more in synch with one another is to facilitate a
“calibration session” just before performance reviews
are conducted with employees.
A calibration session catches the “easy graders”
and “tough graders” and helps them rate their employees
more realistically. In addition, managers who are not dealing with
problem performers are challenged to provide honest feedback and a
plan of action. At the same time top performers are identified and
the company’s talent can be managed more proactively.
Here’s how it works.
I ask the manager team to come to the session with rough
drafts of all the performance
reviews for their direct reports. In addition, I ask them to
force rank their employees from lowest to highest performing. They
bring copies for everyone.
We set ground rules for the meeting that set the expectation
that they will be open, honest and use specific examples in our
discussion. We start with the best performers on everyone’s
lists and plot them on a wall chart that indicates results as well
as the interpersonal and customer skills necessary for
success.
Discussion is robust. Managers who have worked with the
individual being discussed provide their own perspectives and
examples of the employee. Someone might give an example of an
exchange between this employee and his own employees, or share
something he saw the employee do when the person’s manager
wasn’t around.
This session needs to be facilitated by a neutral party with
no vested interests and with no political attachments. Sacred cows
need to be roasted and probing questions should be designed to
provoke reflection and open discussion.
Recently, a management team challenged one of their peers to
rate one of his employees higher than he was planning to. In
another case, the group agreed to move a good employee into a job
that fit her skills more closely.
Occasionally a manager will admit the employee didn’t
meet his goals but will want to give a good rating anyway. The
healthy dialogue challenges the manager to reconsider his rating
and come into line and hold the employee accountable.
The outcomes of a calibration session are many. And over time,
a leader team gets more skilled at the process.
Here are some outcomes you can count on:
- The leader team takes ownership of the talent they share among them, not just for their own direct reports.
- They hold each other accountable to enforce high standards.
- The leaders use the same language and have a shared understanding of the competencies and expectations of behavior.
- Hard and easy graders are influenced and come into line with their peers.
- Decisions about high and low performers are made and supported as a group.
- Every employee has the benefit of more than one rater assessing their performance.
- Senior manager(s) in the room see first hand how their mangers are developing and managing their human resources.
If you’ve never had a calibration session with your
manager team I urge you to consider it. Not only is it the right
thing to do for your employees, it’s a great leader
development process for your entire management team.
