Judging employees on results could reward luck over skill, argue top psychologists, and there’s a better way to do it
In most workplaces today, you don’t earn an “A” for effort.
If you failed to make a sale even though you sat at your desk for hours every day calling clients, it’s hard to believe you’ll get a pat on the back — or a promotion. Results matter.
But top psychologists argue that this system of evaluating performance is heavily flawed.
At the World Business Forum in New York, Daniel Kahneman told the audience that organizations should evaluate employees’ process instead of their outcome.
Michael Sauers is currently the Director of Technology for Do Space in Omaha, NE. Michael has been training librarians in technology for the past twenty years and has also been a public library trustee, a bookstore manager for a library friends group, a reference librarian, serials cataloger, technology consultant, and bookseller since earning his MLS in 1995 from the University at Albany’s School of Information Science and Policy. Michael has also written dozens of articles for various journals and magazines and his fourteenth book, Emerging Technologies: A Primer for Librarians (w/ Jennifer Koerber) was published in May 2015 and more books are on the way. In his spare time he blogs at travelinlibrarian.info, runs The Collector’s Guide to Dean Koontz Web site, takes many, many photos, and typically reads more than 100 books a year.
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