Performance Reviews Should Reflect Integrity and Fairness

Performance reviews should reward hard work and achievement. Instead, they are often used as a tool to withhold raises and suppress high performers. This goes against the biblical principle of fairness: "Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in your power to act." (Proverbs 3:27, NIV)

Imagine exceeding expectations in every major area—leading projects, driving innovation, and saving the company millions—only to have one minor, irrelevant shortfall used against you. That single metric, worth barely three percent of your total evaluation, becomes the excuse leadership needs to deny your raise.

What’s really going on here?

The Hidden Agenda Behind Performance Reviews When leadership manipulates performance reviews, it often boils down to two things:

1. Budget Manipulation – Leadership has been instructed to cut costs, and raises were never really on the table. Instead of being transparent, they use performance reviews to justify financial decisions they had already made.
2. Job Protection – A high performer is a threat. If someone is too effective, leadership fears they could replace them or their peers. Instead of rewarding success, they suppress it.

This is not just mismanagement—it is a failure of leadership at the highest level. "Woe to those who call evil good and good evil." (Isaiah 5:20, NIV)

The Work of a Leader, The Title of a Junior Employee Picture this: You hire someone who…

• Redesigns your entire enterprise authentication system, consolidating legacy identity providers, improving security, and streamlining access management across global offices.
• Rearchitects your cloud infrastructure, implementing automation and cost optimization strategies that reduce cloud spend by 30%.
• Deploys a company-wide endpoint security solution, eliminating compliance gaps and ensuring regulatory standards are met.
• Overhauls your software deployment pipeline, reducing downtime and increasing application deployment speed.

Despite these high-impact contributions, they are given a low-level, outdated title that does not reflect their expertise or leadership. Worse, an unqualified peer employee—who had no role in the transformation—is placed above them, or the person does not receive the proper raise for their work.

This is not just mismanagement. This is incompetence in leadership. "For the LORD is a God of justice; blessed are all who wait for him." (Isaiah 30:18, NIV)

Performance Reviews as a Political Weapon This pattern repeats across industries. Consider a Director of IT Operations who:

• Consolidates data centers, reducing operational costs by millions.
• Implements proactive monitoring tools, preventing costly outages and improving service reliability.
• Leads a full-scale IT modernization project, replacing outdated systems with cutting-edge solutions that drive business growth.

Yet, when performance reviews come around:

• Healthcare Industry: Review obsesses over a trivial patch delay to deny a raise; CTO’s college buddy leaps to VP; title stays frozen despite measurable impact.
• Financial Services: Review fixates on an intranet hiccup to block a raise; CEO’s golf pal vaults to CTO; title remains static despite driving profits.
• Logistics Industry: Review clings to a random metric to reject a raise; a connected but clueless peer jumps ahead; title doesn’t budge despite clear organizational value.

This doesn’t just happen in IT. It happens in finance, healthcare, engineering, and beyond. Talented professionals are being deliberately held back—not because of their performance, but because of leadership’s insecurity. "Masters, treat your bondservants justly and fairly, knowing that you also have a Master in heaven." (Colossians 4:1, ESV)

How Do We Fix This?

Require Peer-Based Leadership Evaluations Leadership performance reviews should not be dictated by a single boss with a personal agenda. Instead:

• CIOs, CFOs, or an executive committee should collect feedback from multiple department heads.
• If a leader is found to be suppressing talent, they should be placed under review—with potential termination for repeated offenses.

Enforce Anti-Retaliation Protections Performance reviews should assess leadership fairly, not be weaponized for personal or political reasons. However, safeguards must also exist to prevent false feedback aimed at replacing a leader.

• Employees who submit false or malicious feedback to remove a leader should face consequences.
• Leadership retaliation against high performers should result in immediate disciplinary action or termination.

Align Titles and Compensation with Responsibilities A key indicator of leadership failure is misclassifying roles. If an organization cannot recognize the contributions of its top talent, they are actively driving away innovation.

• Titles should accurately reflect scope, impact, and leadership level. If someone transforms IT strategy, they should be a Director or VP, not a Manager or Administrator.
• Raises should be based on objective contributions—not political maneuvering.

Final Thoughts Leadership is not about controlling budgets and protecting egos. It’s about recognizing talent, fostering innovation, and rewarding those who drive success. "Whoever walks in integrity walks securely, but whoever takes crooked paths will be found out." (Proverbs 10:9, NIV)

If leadership:

• Manipulates performance reviews to deny raises,
• Misclassifies high performers to suppress career growth,
• Promotes political allies instead of recognizing real contributors,

Then they are not fit to lead.

Organizations that fail to recognize their top talent will lose them to companies that do. "The laborer deserves his wages." (1 Timothy 5:18, ESV)

Article based on generalized examples and very common industry scenarios.