As managers, how effectively we carry out performance appraisals may have a major impact on how well our unit does and how we are evaluated as managers.
Extensive literature has evolved to help us design systems that are designed to result in accurate and helpful appraisals. Yet despite this, comments such as the one above are not unusual. While appraisal is supposed to be objective and accurate, the reality is closer to the manger's comments above. Many managers deliberately distort and manipulate appraisals for political purposes. This would suggest that the literature on designing appraisals and training aimed at helping managers give accurate appraisals miss a crucial point: appraisals take place in an environment that is anything but completely rational. In the real world, managers may have needs other than being completely accurate and rational. Managers giving appraisals have other motives and purposes that may supersede a concern for accuracy.
The mere fact that you have to write out your assessment and create a permanent record will cause people not to be as honest or accurate as they should be. We soften the language because our ratings go into the person's file in HRM and it follows him his whole career.
The fact that the process is ultimately tied to money influences the ratings a person receives.. Whenever a decision involves money things can get very emotional and ticklish.
I want to keep my people happy; sure I inflate some ratings to maximize pay increases; sometimes I'll lower ratings to send a message. We all manipulate ratings at times to deal with the money issue. But look what HRM does. They say that outstanding performers get a 7-10% raise but that since money is tight not to give anyone a top rating. They make us adjust the ratings to fit the money available for raises.
We have a very political climate here; performance appraisal will be very political in a place like this.
Where my bosses look at the ratings, I take it seriously; if they don't take it seriously, I won't. Typically the higher you get in this organization, the less your boss really knows your people and less likely to question your judgment; this is where I use more discretion.
I try to use the appraisal process to my advantage; I use it to keep my people going. I'm not off to tick people off; I want to make them happy. I had this guy going through a divorce; I'm not going to kick him while he's down even if his performance is off.
There are two reviews-the written one and the spoken one. The spoken one is the real one since I don't want to put some things down on paper.
If two people performed at the same level and the second one tried harder, I'd give the second one higher ratings.
Sometimes I'll give a guy I don't like a higher rating just to help get him out of here.
I'll use the appraisal to shock an employee even if it's not totally accurate.
Managers felt that it was within their managerial discretion to make sure that excessively accurate ratings do not cause problems for themselves. These "adjustments" are used to avoid unnecessary conflict, use the bureaucracy to their advantage and minimize the extent to which administrative responsibilities create barriers between them and their subordinates. The culture in the organization will play a big role; in some organizations, this distortion will be far more prevalent than others.
There may be times when exercising discretion in appraisals may make sense; perhaps those managers who use this discretion get far more out of the process than those who follow the system bureaucratically. The degree of openness and trust between manager and subordinate is a huge factor in determining the accuracy of the appraisal how useful the appraisal process is will depend heavily on the commitment of top management, training, open discussions, and rewarding the efforts of managers to do effective appraisals
Managers need to understand not just how appraisals are done but why; the "politics" indicated by the quotes above should not remain a "dirty secret;" they should be openly discussed.
Tying money to appraisals increases the tendency to distortion and politics; we don't suggest this is reason to drop the idea but it does suggest the issue should be confronted
Of course, we can't ignore the impact of legal issues. Accurate, valid appraisals can help an organization defend itself and invalid appraisals can pt the organization at risk. There is a lot of pressure to extensively document cases of poor performance as a defense against legal action.
Effective managers will probably always use politics in the appraisal process as they do in all other aspects of management. Perhaps rather than considering politics a dirty little secret, we should recognize that there is an important role for this discretion. Perhaps our goal should not be to eliminate politics but instead to effectively manage the role politics plays in the appraisal process.