Reference no: EM132241571
Supervisor Carrie Johnson was not at all comfortable with the way the performance appraisal interview with Helen West was going. Helen seemed uncommunicative; she would speak only when asked something, and then only briefly, and Carrie’s two or three attempts to warm the atmosphere with some light remarks had no visible effect.
Except for a brief probationary review of sorts three months after Helen’s transfer to Carrie’s unit, this was the only real opportunity make available for a thorough review of Helen’s performance. Helen had initially seemed eager to have this meeting with Carrie, but upon sitting down together and laying out the completed appraisal forms Helen fell largely silent and seemed to withdraw.
Growing increasingly frustrated with Helen’s apparent unwillingness to participate, Carrie finally stopped in the middle of trying to make a point and said, “Helen, something about this discussion is bothering you. Out with it.” Helen answered that nothing was bothering her. Carrie went on to say, “I know you well enough to know that you’re upset about something. Out with it, so we don’t simply wind up wasting our time here.”
After a moment, Helen said that she was very disappointed in the ratings on her appraisal. “There’s nothing wrong with it,” Carrie said. “It’s comfortably above standard performance and very close to the average of a very good group of people on this unit.
“It’s lower than any score I ever got from my old supervisor, and I’ve done just as well here as I ever did there. You’ve given me the lowest score I’ve gotten in five years.” Carrie insisted it was a good score, but Helen disagreed. She said, “All of you who do these use the same forms and same job descriptions, and the evaluations ought to be consistent.”
“Compared with my old supervisor, aren’t you telling me that after all my hard work I’m still no better than I used to be? Or even that my performance is slipping because I had a higher score last year?”
Questions:
If you found yourself in Carrie’s position, how would you try to explain the difference in evaluation score to this employee?
What, if anything, do you believe the organization should be doing about its performance appraisal system?