February | 2011

Over the past month I’ve had three different CEOs ask me about my blog. Interestingly, two of the three asked me the same two questions (almost word-for-word): (1) Why do I blog; and, (2) Has my blogging caused any significant issues in my workplace? I’ll come back to these questions shortly.

Separation of Work and Professional Opinions

If I have learned anything from my use of social media over the past several months, it is this: It is becoming increasingly difficult to separate what I do from who I am. It seems that the decision to become active in your profession outside of your day job no longer allows for the clean dichotomies of yesteryear. So the question I wrestle now is whether there should be a reasonable expectation of separation between my official work opinions, and my personal and professional opinions (yes, they do sometimes differ). Should my title, position or specific role as an “executive” affect the answer to that question?

Fortunately, in regard to my intention to keep writing this blog, the CEOs who posed these questions are not one to whom I report (although I still hold great respect and admiration for these CEOs). I am forthright with leaders in my organization concerning my social media activity, professional activity, and I am always open to direct and timely feedback - I want to deal directly with any concerns that may exist. I am committed to the short- and long-term success of my organization.

But, I am also interested in joining a much broarder professional dialogue outside the walls that house me; that is how I now learn as a HR leader, and partially how I will bring new ideas and innovations to my workplace, and hopefully to my profession. The underlying factor in this equation is trust. Not trusting your executives (or your employees) seems to be a leadership issue well beyond the scope of socia media and blogs.

The Answer is in the Questions

The two questions posed to me are suggestive of how some CEOs view social media in the context of executive roles. Asking me why I blog is either an attempt to solicit a “real” motive for publicly sharing thoughts and opinions, or it is just simply to satisfy their own curiosity. Asking me if my blogging has caused any issues in my workplace assumes that blogging is likely to be damaging (or at least a risk) to an organization, and I would infer that it conflicts with their personal views about traditional leadership behavior.

The question that I got from my CEO immediately after I disclosed my intent to experiment with an HR blog is this: How will you (I) use the knowledge and experience gained to improve the way that we communicate within our oganization?

The answer is in the question.

What do you think?

[Photo Credit: jscreationzs]

What if I told you that recent research shows nearly 4 out of 5 employees either agree, or strongly agree that their organizations’ performance appraisal processes were instrumental in supporting their professional development? That the data strongly suggests that employees are satisfied with the frequency of feedback, the honesty of feedback, and the timeliness of feedback? Would you believe me?

Chances are that you would think that I’m full of S**t (Soot that is). If you don’t think so, then thank you, and I am very interested in hearing what has worked well in your experience. Based on a number of recent interactions with other Trench HR professionals, it seems that performance management and the use of performance appraisals is a big challenge for many of our organizations.

Approaches to Performance Management

I will suggest that there are generally two philosophical approaches to the development of performance management systems, although many organizations have created a hybrid of these approaches:

Compliance approach. In this approach, performance management is a HR process specifically designed to document employee performance and behavior for use in supporting employment-related decisions. That is, appraisals and other performance documentation (e.g. corrective actions) are used to cover our backsides when it comes to compliance: Title VII, Affirmative Action, collective bargaining agreements, etc. In other words, compliance is largely about creating written documentation to fend off potential litigation, and to justify the decisions that we have already made.

Organization development approach. In this approach, performance management is a comprehensive leadership system designed to continuously develop the organization’s people.

The Illusion of Performance Management

Performance management is not a performance appraisal process, and a performance appraisal process is not performance management.

We have mistaken the process of completing prescribed performance documentation for it being a key driver for the development of our people. It is not. Developing people is rooted in the abilities of leaders to mentor their employees; this requires coaching, feedback and leadership, and not a form, software template or other standardized tool. A highly effective leader can coach and mentor without a tool or process, but even the best appraisal tool in the world will not turn an ineffective leader into a coach or mentor.

What Would Coach Do?

How many organizations do you know that actually train their leaders to be effective coaches and mentors, and provide them with their own coaching and mentoring about their leadership skills? The HR department teaching new supervisors how to complete performance appraisals so that they avoid rater biases is not the same thing as developing leaders to motivate and develop their people.

There are a number of leadership books by and about great coaches in the world of sports. The books describe how successful coaches motivate and develop athletes, and how they build great athletic programs. To my knowledge, none of those who are recognized as being great coaches did so by completing annual performance appraisals on their athletes, with little or no interaction in between. Great coaches are judged by their wins, and in college sports, their ability to recruit great athletes into their programs. Great coaches are great leaders, not unbiased raters and compliant managers.

Development Has a Future Orientation

The traditional HR approach to performance management is rooted in documenting the past performance and behavior of employees. That is what most HR practitioners train managers to do. I understand that performance needs to be documented to support employment-related decisions, however it has little to do with really developing our people. An annual, retrospective grading of what has already occurred (with varying perceptions about its basis in reality) will in itself do little to promote the future development of people.

Performance management needs to be based on how we coach, mentor and develop our people with a future orientation. Here is the theory: The foundation of an effective performance management system lies in an intentional leadership development process. In other words, if we expect our leaders to be effective coaches and mentors, then we must first invest in the development of those leaders. Without effective leaders, the performance appraisal process is doomed to being little more than a HR record-keeping process, and a poor illusion for a performance management system. One more thing: giving our leaders feedback and development about their leadership and coaching abilities should probably consist of more than an annual performance appraisal.

I’m interested in hearing what you think.

[2600 Phrases for Effective Performance Reviews]