I was in a different city for a learning program recently and there decided to spend a day extra and stay with a couple, who are both batchmates from my B-School.
The husband is a Manager with one of the tech MNCs and the wife is handling marketing for a division of a MNC bank. It was a Sunday morning when after a great breakfast, the guy got up and said "I'll take some time and be back. Got some work."
"Oh really? On Sunday? OK"
"Actually I have to fill my self-appraisal form as part of the Annual Performance Management Process"
At which point the wife said "Do you guys really take self-assessment that seriously? We also have it, but only fill it when our manager says - one hour to go - that means he's got to fill his self -assessment then!"
"Well, it is important in my firm as the self-assessment is the basis of how my manager evaluates me, and during the normalisation process, it is the thing my manager leans more on"
"Well theoretically we have solid HR processes in our bank too... however..."
"You can't have a theoretical solid process, while practically it's being taken for a ride"
The conversation came to a natural end at this point, and as I listened to it, I could not help but wonder how the same process is made to work in one organization and taken for a ride in another.
So, how do you see your processes, as a ritual, or as something that adds value.
Remember, if often how you see them, that will determine their value or not.
Gautam,
ReplyDeleteThat was a good area to use as an example.
The ritualization usually happens as a result of nothing of consequence being done with the information. Self-assessments, performance reviews and the like often end up only being an exercise that allows an organization to assign numerical ratings that will fit into the compensation system.
Yet all of this information exists as a treasure just waiting to be used for professional development.
As consultants, we can push the issue of turning theory into practice. It's the right thing to do.