How Performance Management Is Killing Performance—and What to Do About It

Chapter 4

THE THREE COMMON GOALS

BEFORE WE HIT THAT REBOOT BUTTON, let’s get absolutely clear on what performance management is and why we do it.

Because of its management-by-objectives roots, traditional performance management has historically operated as an individual’s scorecard of accomplishments (or failings). However, in recent years we’ve seen more organizations try to do more with their performance management programs, using them as a means to focus on the development of the individual employee and to link individual goals to company objectives. HR professionals talk about a variety of goals they hope to achieve, including “differentiated distribution of rewards, based on individual performance”;¹ “creating a high performance culture”; ...