According to an organization called the "The Conference Board" just 45% of workers are satisfied with their jobs, down from 61% in 1987.
While the usual culprits are responsible for this decline (bad bosses, job insecurity, a rotten and decaying ecchonomy) Samuel A. Culbert, a clinical psychologist at UCLA says too many people work in "toxic" environments. His new book casts an interesting light on what Culbert believes are some of the causes of this toxicity, it's called "Get Rid of the Performance Review!" http://www.performancepreview.com/ His website proclaims: "It's time to put the performance review out of its misery."
Culbert states: "The performance review. It is one of the most insidious, most damaging, and yet most ubiquitous of corporate activities. We all hate it. And yet nobody does anything about it."
Culbert's site also has a quiz: "How much do you hate performance reviews?" http://www.performancepreview.com/survey.html
which you can take right here.
Now, here's the thing. Performance reviews are a concoction of HR. What the fuck does HR do but intimidate, frustrate, bog down with rules and cost money. While we're eliminating reviews, let's kill HR.
Those same group of employees will tell you they don't get enough feedback on how well they are performing their job...
ReplyDeleteI don't think performance reviews need to be scrapped altogether, just modified. Feedback is important. Not only does it show you what you are doing right and where you can improve, it keeps people within an organization communicating.
That can't be a bad thing.
Perhaps get the creatives on it to find a way to make it new, interesting, and less stressful/more useful.
(Yeah, I know. But it's a thought...)
~Graham
I had a boss who made it real simple.
ReplyDeleteHe used to ask "are they good or do they suck?"
"When it's Friday and the pitch is on Monday, do you want them in the room?"
But George, we've had too many of the "smartest" guys in the room. That's why the US economy collapsed. What we need is a way to recognize the talent and good ideas that lie outside the room. But as long as the entrenched ruling class of egomanical creative driectors continue to run things, nothing is going to change.
ReplyDelete