This post speaks to me as I've spent the last 6+ years working on making performance reviews better. There are many things wrong with performance reviews. For me, the worst thing is that usually they are done only once a year.
We tend to remember most recent things and assign them greater value. This means that if a below-average colleague did something phenomenal a month before the review, they will receive a more favorable review. Along the same vein, if a well-performing colleague slips up right before review time, this will unfairly penalize her. Annual performance reviews are bad because they are done 50 weeks too late.
We've been trying to address this at the current company I am working with. At 15Five we are building tools for continuous employee feedback and performance assessment.
There should be multiple communication processes going on all at once, with different cadence, that all add up to one's perception of an employee's performance.
We have weekly check ins, which are meant to be answered in less than 15 minutes and reviewed in less than five (hence the name!). People set goals one week and rate them the next. This has a biweekly cadence. Longer terms objectives and key results can be tracked as well, usually on a monthly or quarterly. All this feeds into a performance review, which ideally should happen quarterly, but can be done less often. The difference is that you don't spend a week before the performance review is due trying to remember how each of your team members did. You have that right in front of you, as you've spent the last X months interacting with them, having conversations, and earmarking notable feedback and conversations.
Our customers are happy with this process as an alternative to annual performance reviews.
If you go to far to the other direction, you'll also create stress. People's output will vary depending on many factors. So now you'll have peopple worrying about microfluctuations in their output.
We tend to remember most recent things and assign them greater value. This means that if a below-average colleague did something phenomenal a month before the review, they will receive a more favorable review. Along the same vein, if a well-performing colleague slips up right before review time, this will unfairly penalize her. Annual performance reviews are bad because they are done 50 weeks too late.
We've been trying to address this at the current company I am working with. At 15Five we are building tools for continuous employee feedback and performance assessment.
There should be multiple communication processes going on all at once, with different cadence, that all add up to one's perception of an employee's performance.
We have weekly check ins, which are meant to be answered in less than 15 minutes and reviewed in less than five (hence the name!). People set goals one week and rate them the next. This has a biweekly cadence. Longer terms objectives and key results can be tracked as well, usually on a monthly or quarterly. All this feeds into a performance review, which ideally should happen quarterly, but can be done less often. The difference is that you don't spend a week before the performance review is due trying to remember how each of your team members did. You have that right in front of you, as you've spent the last X months interacting with them, having conversations, and earmarking notable feedback and conversations.
Our customers are happy with this process as an alternative to annual performance reviews.