What do you do if stress is affecting the fairness and impartiality of performance evaluations?

1 Identify the sources of stress

Stress can be difficult to manage, but the first step is to identify what causes it. Managers who conduct performance evaluations may experience high expectations and pressure from senior management or clients, lack of clear criteria or standards for evaluation, conflicting or competing demands from different stakeholders, fear of negative reactions or feedback from employees, or personal issues that affect their mood or focus. To address these sources of stress, managers should communicate their expectations and goals with senior management or clients, establish clear and consistent criteria for evaluation, prioritize and delegate tasks, prepare for possible negative reactions, and take care of their physical and mental health. With these steps in mind, managers can better cope with stress.

3 Avoid cognitive biases

The third step to ensure fair and impartial performance evaluations is to avoid cognitive biases that can distort your perception and evaluation of the employee's performance. Cognitive biases are mental shortcuts or errors that affect how we process information and make decisions. Examples of cognitive biases include the halo effect, which is the tendency to let one positive trait or aspect of the employee influence your overall evaluation, and the horns effect, which is the opposite of the halo effect. Additionally, there is the recency effect, which gives more weight to recent events or information, and the similarity effect, which favors employees who are similar to you. Lastly, there is the contrast effect, which compares employees with each other rather than with established criteria or standards. To avoid cognitive biases, you should be aware of your own assumptions, preferences, and emotions that may affect your evaluation; seek feedback from others; review the employee's performance over the entire evaluation period; evaluate each employee individually and objectively based on established criteria or standards; and use a rating scale or a rubric to guide your evaluation and reduce subjectivity.

5 Manage your stress

The fifth step to ensure fair and impartial performance evaluations is to manage your own stress, which can affect not only your fairness and impartiality, but also your health, well-being, and performance. To do so, it’s important to recognize the signs and symptoms of stress, such as headaches, fatigue, irritability, and anxiety. Additionally, you should identify and use coping strategies like breathing exercises or meditation, seek social support from family or friends, maintain a healthy lifestyle with enough sleep and water, and reward yourself for your efforts. Stress management is a crucial skill for managers who conduct performance evaluations; by following these five steps you can reduce your stress and ensure that your performance evaluations are fair and impartial. This will benefit not only you but also your employees and your organization.