Performance Review

Get rid of it ! (G&M)

The author recommends performance discussions start with the boss asking a subordinate three questions. The boss is not allowed to provide any reactions to the answers.

1. What do you like to get in the way of supervision that helps you operate effectively? Give an example or two to illustrate what that type of help/support/treatment from a boss distinctively does for you.

2. What have you gotten from a boss with whom you’ve previously worked that doesn’t sit very well with you? Give an example or two of what you’ve found distracting or got in the way of your preferred mode of operating.

3. What do I need to understand about you that I can be alert to in terms of providing you the type of help/support/advice/treatment that you’d like to receive? Can you tell me something about your background that might make this too vivid to ignore?

Then the boss answers three similar questions. They explore what the boss would like to get from an employee to provide the level of oversight needed; what inclinations you have that you think might have hurt the performance of a subordinate; and what are the distinctive features of the type of relationship you like to have with a subordinate, and how do you go about creating it.