Supervisors who are new to performance management can learn from the common performance management mistakes of other managers.
The Halo Effect When Evaluating Employee Performance
When one attribute is recognized and emphasized over all other attributes this is called the Halo Effect. When a supervisor fails to recognize that they are blinded by one aspect of the employee’s performance (be it positive or negative) they forget to evaluate and provide feedback on other important behavioural challenges, strengths or skill gaps. The Halo Effect is a common problem with employees who are overly friendly or overly confrontational. These employees exhibit extreme behaviours that can overshadow their true work performance.
To avoid the Halo Effect, set clear performance targets so that the employees performance is measured against these targets and not the halo behaviour.
The Middle of the Road Effect During Employee Reviews
Some supervisors, in an attempt to not rate an employee too high for fear they will not strive to improve or too low so they will feel defeated, rate employees in the middle of the scale.
The consequence of supervisors rating all of their team in the middle of the scale is that an employee’s strengths and weaknesses are not identified, commented or coached on. This means that an improvement plan cannot be created. Employees need to understand their areas of weakness so they can work on improving them and their areas of strength so they can feel a sense of satisfaction. The danger of the middle of the road effect is that employees can disengage and lose respect for their manager's ability to coach them to excellence.
To avoid the Middle of the Road Effect, supervisors should spend time listing the strengths and weaknesses of their team members outside of the performance review form or software in order to determine which areas should be rated high or low.
The Comparison Effect When Managing Employee Performance
Supervisors who rate employees positively because they possess similar attributes, or rate them poorly because they fail to mirror their strengths or the attributes or strengths of star employees, are demonstrating the Comparison Effect. The Comparison Effect prevents managers from recognizing important negative or positive differences that require feedback and coaching.
To avoid the comparison effect, measure employees against clearly defined performance targets that have been agreed to by the employee.
Overall, to avoid making the above mistakes during the performance review process, managers need to take a step back and look at their team member`s performance objectively. Clearly defining performance targets and asking the employee to self evaluate their performance can also help to avoid these common mistakes or biases when evaluating employee performance.
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