Authenticity & Performance Reviews
It’s almost the New Year.
Soon, if not already, many of you will be working on closing out the old year and setting you and your organizations up for success in the New Year. I’m talking performance reviews, goal setting and authenticity, Bold Leaders.
What does authenticity have to do with performance reviews and goal setting? Ev-ery-thing.
(Head's Up: Longer message alert! Stay with me. We've got to unpack the good stuff and get you ready for these reviews!)
Authenticity is driven by four core tenets: self-honesty, courage, confidence, and resilience. Self-honesty is number one! It is foundational. Self-honesty has everything to do with how we evaluate ourselves, and others, and how we establish goals for ourselves, our teams, and our organizations.
Self-honesty means we reflect on the truth of our performance, where we are, and where we want to go with our careers. Self-honesty applied to our teams and organizations means we reflect honestly on the truth of the teams’ performance, how each person is performing, and where you need to lead the team through the goals that you set.
As you come into this season of reviewing performance and setting new goals for yourself and your team, I want you to start with a deep moment of self-honesty about YOUR performance and YOUR career goals. Here’s a checklist:
Looking at each goal, rate your performance along three criteria:
For each rating, respond to the following:
Each experience – horrible or amazing – offers us insight into ourselves. The purpose when you are assessing performance is to discover those insights. It’s about development. Coming out the other side of an experience somehow better. I mean, if you’re going to spend the time doing something on behalf of someone else, shouldn’t you get something lasting from it?
A little sidebar: I’m a recovering corporate soldier and I absolutely understand the role that goal achievement plays in the success of an organization. But here’s the thing, we get the most from our teams when they see clearly what’s in it for them.
Sometimes that’s a financial goal. But money comes and money goes. You can’t take away learning. Learning stays with us. It builds our resume. It makes us attractive and valuable to organizations. Some people only care about the money. And that’s ok. But understanding how you grew – whether you value that or not – stays with you forever.
Now, we pivot to your team. The questions still apply. Here’s how.
First, ask your team members to evaluate themselves against each goal and come to the table with responses to what they learned, the skill they developed, what they would do differently, and how they enjoyed the experience. Have them reflect on the experiences for insights about their development, not just check the performance review box.
Second, as YOU evaluate each team member, apply the same questions listed above, excluding enjoyment. This requires that you reflect not only on goal attainment for each team member, but on development also. Be reflective on those questions about learnings, development, and opportunities to do things differently. This is an opportunity to provide honest feedback in a way that focuses on contributing to someone’s overall work experience and their development.
Don’t be scared. Lean in.?Being asked to provide feedback is a privilege because you can shape a person’s work experience and their development through the way that you respond. Be thoughtful about it. Don’t shrink in the moment.
Now that you’re all primed for self-assessment and for giving performance feedback, here’s your DEI coachable moment:?There are tons of data out there that demonstrate that overall in performance assessment, chances are that men are evaluated more positively than women and whites are evaluated more positively than people of color. And if you’re a woman of color, it’s double indemnity: you’re being evaluated among the lowest. Bias is one of the main culprits causing these results.
BOLD leaders are going to address the challenge. They’re going to understand the top biases1 that get in the way of doing an equitable and fair job of performance review and they’re going to tackle them on the front end.
Here’s what gets in the way and how to tackle it.
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Expedience Bias: If it’s obvious, it must be true. What is easy and expedient, is given more credit.
BOLD Leader Hack: Think "What have you done beyond the data?" Look for the bigger story. How has this person contributed beyond the obvious? What brought the data to fruition? How did your team member contribute?
Distance Bias: The here and now is more important and valuable than the past. It’s the “what have you done lately” way of thinking. We give more emphasis to things that are right in front of us, that we can recall, than the things we have to work harder to remember or find.
BOLD Leader Hack: Think "What have you done ALL year?" Go back. Check your notes. Tell the WHOLE story please! Not what’s right in front of you for the past couple of months. Don’t be lazy. Do the work. Earn that leader paycheck!
Similarity Bias: I’m cool. And a great performer. You’re like me – white, or male, or gay, or graduated from the same college, or anything like me – so you’re cool. And a great performer too! We give too much credit to those who are like us – ingroup – versus those who we perceive as different from us – outgroup.
BOLD Leader Hack: Back to our definition of diversity: you are different from others in some ways, and you are like others in MANY ways. Reflect on the commonality BEFORE the performance review.
This one is a biggee, BOLD LEADERS! Minorities and women struggle every day to climb the corporate ladder because too often those who are evaluating their performance and potential unconsciously (or consciously) see these individuals as outgroup and don’t seek to find the commonality. Evaluations are stricter and harsher than for their ingroup counterparts. Don’t make this mistake!
Which brings us right back to self-honesty.
???? Basic leaders will say they are self-honest and that they always attempt to evaluate themselves and others fairly.
???? ???? Bold Leaders acknowledge the three biases, understand the hacks, and apply the advice.
???? ???? ???? But BADA$$ leaders? They are the most self-honest. They know they won’t do their best without support on this tough issue. They acknowledge that bias is a fact of life – it’s built into the brain. They work hard intentionally to manage the biases. And they let their team know that they are working on this and to hold them accountable.
Why be Basic or BOLD, when you can be BADA$$? ??
More to come on authentic goal setting in our next issue.
BE AUTHENTIC.
CHOOSE BOLDLY.
MAKE A DIFFERENCE.
-Tracy
P.S. And if you’re motivated to learn more about self-honesty in performance reviews, check out these HBR articles.