How to Do Performance Reviews — Remotely

One may have conducted hundreds of performance reviews throughout the career but today everyone is working remotely for months now and the task becomes really difficult to evaluate them. How to ensure fairness when everyone's circumstances are different.

Even in normal times, very few managers enjoy doing performance reviews. These reviews are tense, stressful, and lead to anxieties. Today with most of the employees working remotely it becomes a greater challenge. Everyone is wrestling with uncertainty and are stretched in their way. It is under these circumstances that one is expected to make an emphatic assessment. The following strategies are pointers that would help in assessing remote employees.

Reflect on your purpose

Why is the review being conducted in the first place especially during an epidemic? It is to strengthen the organization's culture and reinforce its values, rather than giving a raise or weeding out poor performers. These evaluations are one of the strongest anchors and artifacts of your corporate culture and it should be used wisely. Talk about ner term and long term goals. Work together to figure out how to communicate it to the workforce as part of evaluations.

Think about what you are evaluating

Also, you should ve clear on what you are evaluating. Are you comparing the sales now with sales before the epidemic? Or how well are they doing now? Performance evaluation is a comparison of performance against targets. In most cases, the targets were set before the epidemic and are no longer valid as the goalposts have shifted and the context has changed. It would be very unfortunate if the focus was on the transactional aspect of performance when you should be considering the employees' empathy, resilience, and capacity to adapt to the situation now. Teamwork and collaboration should be acknowledged and rewarded.

Summon compassion

With most members working from home, the approach calls for more compassion, flexibility, and leniency. You can't look only at the deliverables but understand the constraints under which they are working from home. You need to give people more latitude.

Consider doing away with ratings

rating employees in this situation is going to be difficult because many are not able to give 100% of their attention to the work on hand and hence should be done away for the moment. Instead, you could create a flexible system that recognizes the constraints that many people are facing and do a more narrative assessment that provides members with information about where they have done well and where they need to improve.

Gather different kinds of data

The main problem of doing the evaluation is that today when people have gone remote you do not have as much data as you normally have as they are seen in person and your old biases are going to be amplified. You need to be conscious of these biases and look for different data. You may request self-evaluation and peer opinions,

Set the right tone

Video conferencing fatigue is real, but for evaluation, it is better to have a video call. It is more personal and humane and also you can see people in their living room or elsewhere. Be open and warm and pay close attention to the body language. Listen carefully and encourage a two-way conversation. Spend time to make sure messages are not lost in translation.

Tread lightly with poor performers

In normal times, managers can confront poor performers and demand improvement. If someone is not delivering find out the reasons and help in resolving where possible. Build some slack in the system to deal with such members. You could allow them to get used to remote working and turn things around.

Be effusive with your stars

It is important to acknowledge your high performers. Make sure you recognize and appreciate their performance. Reassurance and praise would mean a lot for your employees' peace of mind. the best way to offer them cope with uncertainty is to offer them some certainty. 

Look to the future

Since work from home is going to continue for quite some time and is the new normal, it is important to consider how the evaluations will be done in the future. In this situation, it is better to have more frequent evaluations and provide real feedback to employees and give them a chance to make adjustments. The new way of working could be a catalyst to change the organization's performance culture. It provides an opportunity for a people-focused management system, resilience, and agility instead of efficiency and competitiveness.

Dos'

• Approach evaluations more flexibly, understanding, leniency, and compassion.
• Recognize and show appreciation to employees who are engaged and working hard.
• Use the video for conversation. It is more humane and personal.

Don'ts'

• Don't be hard on poor performers. Give them time to turn things around.
• Don't let your biases cloud your thinking. Get alternative data. Ask colleagues and subordinates on the employees' communication, collaboration efforts.
• Don't revert to business as usual. Think of how to make evaluation better.

How to Do Performance Reviews — Remotely

by Rebecca Knight HBR June 15, 2020