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Category: Performance Reviews & Goals

Don’t Ask if You Really Don’t Want to Know

Don’t Ask if You Really Don’t Want to Know

“I really want feedback on my performance. I especially like to hear where I can improve,” a new direct report told me eagerly. Steve looked sincere. He acted sincere. So I thought he was sincere. I then proceeded to tell him that he needed to be more careful about the type of information he was sharing with people as it was causing people to think that features were changing in the product. His opinion was affecting the progress of the project as people didn’t want to work on features if they were going to change. Steve then became really upset with me asking who said that about him and stating loudly that people shouldn’t be so sensitive. He ranted. He raved. I was taken aback and surprised.

Was it my delivery? Or did he really not want to know of any areas of improvement?

I try to be very careful how I discuss areas of improvements with employees. It can be a constructive conversation but also has the potential to blow up in your face. To make it a constructive conversation, I use something recent to demonstrate where I think someone can improve. I put it in writing, if needed.

For example, say I have an employee that is having difficulty with communicating with those that don’t agree with him. Let’s call him Bob. It is a constant issue, not a one-time occurrence. In a meeting with a group of Bob’s peers, I watched while he became frustrated with trying to explain his viewpoint to someone. He ended the conversation with, “I just don’t know what more to say to you,” sighed, threw his hands up in the air and sullenly looked down at the table. The person on the receiving end visibly bristled and said, “Well then, I guess we are done here,” and left the room.

I took that situation and asked him, “Was that the outcome you wanted?” Of course it wasn’t and he said so. Then I asked, “How could it have ended differently?” This opened up a conversation between the two of us to explore how he could have handled things better. I made sure to say that this is an area of improvement for him and asked him to suggest how we monitor it to see how he improved.

But sometimes, even with using specific situations as examples such as the ones with Bob, it doesn’t matter because the person really doesn’t want to get the feedback. They really, really don’t. Like Steve. I did try to work with him and provide him with specific situations in which his behavior affected people but he always became upset and wanted to confront the person or persons, as he knew they were wrong. I realized that he really didn’t want to hear anything but positive feedback.

If you don’t want feedback, don’t ask for it. Everyone likes positive feedback, and I’m happy to give them that but I believe in balanced feedback. None of us are perfect. We are all works in process. I always benefit when my manager reminds me I am impatient and she points it out to me after a meeting. I know I lose support from people with my impatience. I work on it, but every now then, it seeps through. Reminding me helps me to remember this is something that didn’t magically go away. It takes constant mindfulness on my part to avoid expressing impatience.

If you really want constructive feedback, ask for it. But if you really just want to hear how great you are, don’t ask.

Cascading Goals Down into an Organization

Cascading Goals Down into an Organization

When the end of the fiscal year approaches it means it’s time to create goals for the next year. At a large company, this can be challenging, as often the corporate goals are sometimes very high-level.

Frequently, I’ve seen people get very cynical about high-level company goals. Or worse yet, software developers who think the company goals have nothing to do with them personally. That’s simply not true. Everyone in the company needs to support the company goals. The work each employee does impacts those goals whether they realize it or not.

Let’s look at an example. If a company has a goal to increase revenue by 30% , how do I, as the manager, translate that into something meaningful for my development teams? I definitely want to support increasing revenue, after all, I want my company to be successful. I want my teams to be aware of this goal for the company and that what they do impacts that goal.

Let’s assume I have a software development team working on a new release of an enterprise software product. The new release will be out in spring. The question to ask is: How will this product release contribute to increasing revenue?

If the release is high-quality, customers will be happy. If it is of low quality, customers will complain and that information could impact sales to other customers. And, if the changes the team makes to the user experience truly are easy-to-use and intuitive versus not so easy to use and not intuitive, that will also impact customers and sales.

So in this example I am going to create goals for my team supporting the revenue goal using these two requirements: high-quality and easy-to-use intuitive software. The goals could be written as:

  1. Release the software with no priority 1, 2, or 3 defects. This will be measured by the number of open defects.
  2. The user interface is intuitive and easy to use. Measured by the feedback from usability studies and comparison with prior testing.
© 2008 Annette Wagner. All Rights Reserved.
©2008 Annette Wagner. All Rights Reserved.

Both of these team goals support the 30% increase in revenue goal. The next step is to translate these product goals into individual contributor goals:

  1. For each software development team member assigned to the April release, they will write unit tests and fix all p1, p2, p3 defects found by QA/QE.
  2. The software development team is required to work closely with the user experience team to create a user interface that is intuitive and easy-to-use and to support user testing needs.

By tying an individual developer’s goals into the company goals, everyone understands how they as well as their  team contribute to the company goals. This not only makes those goals meaningful and achievable, it makes the goals understandable and doable by the team members.

Those Irritating Yearly Performance Reviews

Those Irritating Yearly Performance Reviews

annual review road sign illustration design over white

Everyone groans when they are told they need to do yearly performance reviews. Why? While I’m sure you can state lots of reasons, I believe its because they aren’t done correctly. The first problem is that it is a yearly performance review. If I’m giving feedback just once a year to my employees, I’m doing something wrong.

Reviews are an opportunity to give people feedback on how well they are, or are not, doing their job. Giving feedback is key in keeping the communication flowing between a manager and an employee and keeping things on track. If we give feedback just once a year how can we possibly do a great job at remembering all the things that happened, especially early in the year?

When a review is a once a year drive-by, often no examples are shared with regard to why the manager is giving particular feedback. This annoys the employee and prevents a productive conversation. The better solution is to give your employees feedback continuously. This might sound time consuming, but it’s not.

Don’t wait for the end of the year to review someone’s performance.

Make it a continuous conversation throughout the year.

I keep a document I share with the employee that details what we both agree are his or her goals for the year. These include both business and professional development goals.

In weekly meetings with each employee, I check in with the person on their progress. We add the status of each goal directly to the document so we both know how things are going. By “we” I do mean both of us. It’s not just me writing this stuff up; the employee has a voice too. This doesn’t have to be done weekly. Do what makes sense. It can be bi-weekly or monthly. But don’t go beyond a month – that’s too long to go without discussing goals and status.

If an employee gets a kudo from a team member or from someone outside of the team, that feedback goes directly into the document. If there is negative feedback, that goes into the document too so that we can work on a plan for improvement.

When the annual review rolls around, you have all of the information in that document to complete the review. You can cut and paste, where appropriate, from the document into the formal annual review. When a summary of overall performance is required, you have the details in the document on progress throughout the year to review and then include in the yearly formal annual review.

Creating a meaningful conversation around progress towards goals

is a two way street.

A second problem with yearly performance reviews is that reviews are often considered a push activity – from the manager to the employee. The reality is that reviews are a two-way street. The employee’s participation is just as important as the manager’s. The employee has to be engaged or it won’t be successful. They are the ones doing the actual work and it is their career being impacted by the review.

Employees need to learn to ask for timely feedback and career development input. Getting feedback during a project helps the employee to course correct and potentially avoid issues. It can directly result in a more successful project which impacts their career in the long run. Career input while in the midst of projects motivates an employee, gains them skills they need, and keeps them on track and happy.

Performance reviews as meaningful conversations around professional growth and achieving goals spur your employees to do their best. So instead of focusing on a big time-consuming yearly performance review, spread your time out and invest smaller chunks of time throughout the year in your employees. You’ll save yourself headaches and have much happier employees.