by K Scappace

Created on: March 24, 2009

In industrial manufacturing, a performance review is a valuable tool. Managers use an establish system of guidelines to quantify employee output vs. increase in pay. The review process encourages dialogue in a controlled setting. In the industrial workplace, an employee completes the day-to-day work by receiving and completing orders. Conversation between worker and manager, not related to the direct task, is not encouraged.

Employers established the performance review as a means to determine equitable pay scale and advancement opportunities. A manager completed a review as recommended by a set of pre-determined guidelines to justify a pay increase. They would discuss the review with the person under review in an interview. The employee was encouraged to discuss and challenge areas of negative impact. Subsequently, upper management weighed the manager's review against the employee's challenge to assess an equitable pay raise. Thus, the performance review served more than one purpose in assessing the employee's performance and subsequently allowing upper management to assess the manager's effectiveness. In an era of industry where employees typically, had less than a high school education, this was an effective means of communication while maintaining the chain of command.

In today's service oriented market, none of this is true. Employers cannot measure work order completion against a tangible product. A subjective third party determines the employee's success or failure. Neither the manager nor the worker can challenge or justify the review. A dialogue cannot be encouraged in this setting. At best, the manager can comment on a specific statement.

A manager can monitor communication between the employee and the customer, but again, the review becomes wholly subjective. In the subsequent interview, the employee cannot challenge a negative impact review based on an objective measure. This puts the employee and manager in adversarial positions that negatively influence the workplace. The employee cannot challenge a perception and the manager cannot defend a subjective conclusion leaving an unresolved conflict on the table.

Finally, the initial purpose of the performance review, to evaluate and justify changes in pay scale according to a set schedule, no longer applies. With the introduction of the cost-of-living raise, an employer no longer needs to evaluate performance to determine how much to pay an employee. They simply build a percentage pay increase as determined by an outside authority into the payroll. Beyond the cost-of-living standard, promotion and high merits are the only reliable guides to determine pay increase for an employee. The employee is forced into a situation where they must exceed a subjective third party standard and come to the positive attention of management at the same time. This places an unfair burden on the employee and still does not guarantee a pay increase.

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