Performance Management >> Data does not lie!
In most organizations, the first quarter of the year is spent in closing performance appraisals and the resultant salary increases and promotions. Performance Appraisal normally starts with writing a self appraisal by each employee. You are expected to compare your performance during the year against the goals that were set for your role. You are also expected to do a self evaluation against the competencies that the organization has set for the role. Your manager then writes out your appraisal keeping in mind the self appraisal and the competencies, as evaluated by him or her. It is then signed off by the boss’s manager.
It is important that you take this exercise very seriously. Decisions on salary and promotions are taken based on these appraisals. It is important for both employees and supervisors to spend adequate time understanding the organizations’s performance appraisal system. Job rotations in the future are also based on the performance appraisal.
It is very important that the employee uses data smartly to bring out the performance over the year. This is the low risk option of managing one’s appraisal. No appraisal method can isolate the impact of human bias but the judicious use of data can minimize the impact of any bias, especially if it is negative. In many organizations where the final appraisal gets signed off by a person two levels up, it would require both the immediate boss and the reviewer to be biased to negatively impact one’s appraisal. Even if the immediate boss is biased, it will be that much harder for the reviewer to be coloured by him, if data is used to substantiate performance. The best option would obviously be if there is no bias, negative or positive ( obviously positive bias would work best , but it is difficult to sustain over a period of time as people or the environment change). For most people, it is downside protection that they look for rather than any upside gain.
There is nothing wrong in putting down one’s achievements in a nice and concise manner. In large organizations, it is important for one to be noticed as the alternative is to be consigned to the sidelines. While a large organization provides anonymity and lots of places to hide in good times, things also get that much brutal in tough times. The best insurance that one can buy is to have one’s performance written out with data to back up the claim. Data does not lie. Instead of using words to describe performance, good leaders look for data.
Even when you are in a job where the results are directly quantified, say a ticketing clerk whose productivity can be measured by the number of tickets issued every day, absenteeism, adherence to shifts etc appraisals would talk of career interests, what next, training needs and the like. Your appraisal is also a peep into the future and it is important that you put down your plans in an appropriate manner.
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