Liberation Over Control: How to Create More Equitable + Customized Performance Management Systems

There’s no shortage of advice on developing workplace diversity, equity, and inclusion practices. In building your internal DEI action plans, you’re likely thinking about day-to-day employee experience, including relationships between managers and direct reports (at least we hope you are!). Yet, it’s clear that many still haven’t considered performance management systems and how they do—or don’t—foster growth for all employees—regardless of their identities or leadership styles of those employees.

You might think standardized performance management practices and tools will create a consistent and fair employee experience. But in reality, most performance management systems are often sources of exclusion, stress, and inequity for employees—limiting the potential of your team. (Honestly, we even hate the name ”performance management.” We’re championing a new kind of process we’re calling a “performance design process.” More on that later.)?

We’re here to say that if you redesign coaching, feedback, evaluation, and calibration techniques through the lens of company values and equity, you will improve performance, build inclusive culture and products, and unleash the greatest potential of every employee.

Historically, performance management systems and processes have been fraught. According to a 2019 Gallup study, only about 10 percent of U.S. workers felt engaged after receiving negative feedback on the job. And nearly 30 percent were so put off by a negative review that they began actively looking for a new job. Moreover, 55 percent of workers believe annual reviews don't improve their performance, according to a 2019 Workhuman Analytics & Research study.

And if we look more closely at performance management systems through the lens of equity, we find that those typically excluded (Black, Indigenous, and Latino/x folks) experience even more harm. For example, Harvard Business Review cites that “several studies have found that Black women’s statements were remembered less quickly and less accurately than those of their white female and male peers.” One analysis at a midsize company even showed that only 9.5% of people of color received mentions of “leadership” in their performance evaluations — more than 70 percentage points lower than white women.

Between the two of us, we have a collective three decades’ worth of industry expertise in everything ranging from transformational org + systems design, inclusion + social justice, org-wide training + leadership development, C-suite executive coaching, award-winning employee experiences, large-scale recruitment strategy, and high-impact employer branding. We’ve seen and done a lot.

And we believe there’s a better way.?

That you can design a system that shifts from a power-driven directive mindset to an inspirational coaching one. From a one-size-fits-all approach to one that is customized and fosters deeper inclusion. From a stodgy annual or quarterly process to a continuous and fluid one. From a frustrating and anxiety-fueled experience to one that nourishes and uplifts.

With the right frameworks in place, we believe you can teach everyone aligned with your mission and values how to do this with care, candor, and humility—ultimately helping people become the best version of the unique leader they’re inherently meant to be.

Here are a few quick tips on having better performance management conversations:?

Make a self-check part of your preparation.?

• Teach every member of your team to practice grounding themselves in what they’re bringing to the process. These are things like their own lens on work, intersectional identities, possible biases, and capacity in the moment for the conversation.???

Consider the unique attributes of the employee.

• Next, have everybody consider the person on the other end of the conversation and what they might bring. Not every person can or should be coached the same way, so how might the employee be supported to be the best version of the leader they are destined to be? Consider the aspects of their identities that you are aware of and what current/historical context might be taken into account when framing coaching or feedback. Subtleties like word choices, for example, might carry different implications among people from excluded groups. This brings us to…

Draft your thoughts and have a plan, but allow space for genuine dialogue.?

• So often, we’ve seen leaders provide feedback on the fly that would have been far more effective had they gotten thoughts out on paper first. Sometimes not doing this can even cause harm—for example, telling an employee, “you’re doing well but might go further in sales if you worked on your accent.” Balance this by preparing your thoughts in advance (including specific phrases you’ll use) and bringing a degree of humility—nobody is perfect, and you can’t know everything. Create the right conditions for curiosity, connection, and trust to develop.

And, here are a few of our tips on building a better performance management process:?

Look for parts of the process ripe for bias and redesign them.

• Many performance management processes rely on subjective views of “what good looks like” that can vary from person to person, and change over time. This is like an unpredictable goal post that’s always moving. So, take time to challenge any bias or ambiguity in the goals (be sure to get input from multiple people regularly). Then look for myriad ways to clarify what your leadership expects of employees and continuously communicate it (with written and verbal touchpoints). Design elements of your process to “nudge” people in the right direction—an inclusive and uplifting experience of constantly improving skills to support the employee’s own development and the organization’s purpose. For example, if you use a talent calibration process, default to the highest rating for everybody, then change the argument to “why shouldn’t this person get the highest rating?”?

Make performance management participatory.

• Traditions of power in organizations zap us of our personal agency, and lead us to believe that everybody will always be subordinate to someone else. What might you do to challenge that tradition and shift this to a supportive co-design experience, activating the innate desire that people have to get better at what they do? For example, some organizations have each employee lead their own performance management process (gathering feedback from colleagues and developing a plan for how they want to grow). Others have rituals for promotions in which employees collaborate with a committee of peers (not managers) to determine changes in responsibilities, title, and compensation.

Build a reliable cadence for feedback.

• The days of an annual performance management cycle are over. It’s an outdated, slow, and inefficient method of engaging with employees. Instead, create trusted routines for giving and receiving thoughtful feedback year-round. This could be simple feedback structures in team meetings, regular retrospectives, and inviting employees to celebrate each other’s work.

Want more? Michael Gregor and I launched Liberation Labs to create amazing performance design processes for organizations. Check out our services here.