Here we go again.  The neverending saga of performance evaluations, pay-for-performance, cronyism, etc., continues unabated in a world handicapped by imperfect, biased beings:  humans!

We’ve discussed this issue many times at Understanding Government.  Yet, it’s worth hammering home the point that we humans have these inherent faults, and biases, and bizarre perceptions that preclude development of a universally-accepted employee rating system.

Lest you feel that I’m totally cynically and call for an end to such discussions, allow me to explain.  We must continue to address this problem, if for no other reason than the phenomenon of prejudice may ease somewhat as we move forward.  I believe we’ve seen this occur in the area of race relations.  I think we can make similar improvements in devising and executing better means of fairly evaluating employee efforts in the workplace.

How can I be sure?

Because of a very close friend of mine.  If I were his employee, I’d never get the highest evaluation in my workgroup simply because he knows me.  He’s so sensitized to possibly showing favoritism that he would never allow himself to annoint me as best among the best.  Of course, he’s rather unusual, but if he can act this way, others may respond likewise.  Many probably are today.  Perhaps we focus too much on the negative.

As the attached article from James Colvard in Government Executive astutely states, it’s difficult, if not impossible, to achieve a system that works 100% of the time.  However, he offers an interesting alternative approach based on the military model.

I’m not saying performance appraisals are a hopelessly lost cause.  They simply represent one aspect of the human experience which we all must examine and consider very carefully.  I believe most people do, whether they are the evaluators or the evaluated.  We can hope that even more people will become increasingly mindful of the quirkiness – and danger – of sloppy implementation of such an important workplace process.

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