Part of our effort to further our "goals culture" was to put in place a performance review process that was valuable to both the individual team member as well as the team. I spent a lot of time reviewing performance management systems--all of which focused on reviews--looking at everything from huge companies to tiny start-ups. During this process I discovered that the human resource software market is a very odd one, and one that is mired in old-fashioned ideas and process. In short, many companies acquired products in an effort to provide an all-in-one solution, but the end result was the creation of many companies doing many things, but not doing any of them well.
After sitting through many demos, webinars, tours, I found SuccessFactors. At that point in time, I was impressed with their focus on performance reviews. Unfortunately, they have since gone down the "we do everything" path, which is too bad. Analysts' reports placed them as the leader in this narrow space and provided some great insight into what made them stand out, from the goals library and writing assistant to easy to use routing of forms. We ultimately decided that SuccessFactors would be the best choice for implementing a comprehensive performance review system.
We set out to create a quarterly performance review cycle that would closely align with our company, department and personal goals, while providing valuable and timely feedback to all team members. Of course, there is overhead in setting goals quarterly, between measuring them and providing feedback around goals and core values, but we feel this investment in our people is well worth it.
It's still a learning process for everyone and each quarter we will get better and continue to see the results. It's not perfect by any stretch of the imagination, and the interface is very difficult to use at times, but keeping personal or team member notes isn't efficient, either, and goals were not designed to be completed quarterly. Despite this, we push past these obstacles to make the process the best it can be.
What other software did you look at?
We looked at most people in the industry, made this into a short list and did further investigation of
If you are looking for the Forrester 2007 report (there is a newer one) SuccessFactors has it online.
Certainly quarterly performance reviews are 4x better than annual reviews - but shouldn't the goal be to have "real-time" feedback? In order for that to happen first there must be a systematic way to gather issues and frustrations real time from everyone in the orgainzation and then a method for effectively prioritizing which 3-5 should be focused on based on frequency and impact of the issues.
Excellent point, quarterly reviews need to be part of a larger process. We daily meetings (thanks Verne) things that are holding people up are visible very quickly. Weekly one-on-ones with each team member is also a great opportunity to review goals, give praise, talk about core values, as well as career path when appropriate.
How do you collect and work on these issues in real time?
There is actually a product in Beta right now that aims to achieve this JIT performance review.
http://www.rypple.com/
I am signed up for their beta test but have not had a chance to use it yet. An interesting concept that could be a good supplement to the traditional performance review process provided by SuccessFactors as well as the company where I currently work, StepStone.
For anyone interested in a just released Gartner magic quadrant report on Performance Management systems, you can more info here:
http://www.stepstone.com/2008/?section=media&aID=508
I saw the Rypple application recently and thought it was an interesting concept although seemed to be more focused on a specific question compared with a performance review.
There are some other cool applications doing crowd sourced information/feedback and even praise and recognition tracking.
I'm working on a tool that is specifically dsigned to gather feedback (issues, road-blocks, etc.) that are affecting performance and then posts them on a dashboard based on frequency and impact.
Would love to see this tool and how it works internally.
Have you ever given Review Writer a try? Check it out here: www.managepro.com/products.htm
On another note, don't you find that most businesses that try to "be all to everyone" ultimately fail? Look at Toyota, wanting to be (and getting there) the biggest auto manufacturer while at the same time letting quality slip. They should have kept their focus on their core competency: making dependable automobiles.
Regarding John's comment above about needing "real-time" feedback: I think this is more a matter of management measuring performance on goals or tasks - as they happen. Then documenting their thoughts/assessments immediately.
This would give management the chance to cover important issues with employees right then, or wait until review time and go over their notes.
The problem is people don't like to document regularly, and without documentation management must rely on memory, which is often biased or emotionally based.