Page 160 - Becoming a Successful Manager

Conducting Meaningful Performance Reviews 151

The Performance Review Process

If you do your job correctly, there will be sufficient ongoing com-
munication, so all your employees know what is expected of them
and how well or poorly they are doing. That way, when the formal
review date arrives and the discussions begin, there will be no
surprises.
That’s the way it should be, but not every manager lives
up to this standard. In the following anecdote, the manager,
Mike, thought he was doing well; he thought he was delegating,
but his method and his intervention didn’t lead to a productive
outcome.
Mike said to his employee, Jake, after he was hired, “I describe
my style of management as the Vacuum Theory of Management.”
When Jake asked what that was, Mike said, “As long as everything
is going well, you won’t hear from me, but the minute something
goes wrong, I’ll be all over you like a tent.”
If Jake knew that before he accepted the position, his decision
might have been different. Perhaps he didn’t ask the right questions
during his interview; if he had, he might have realized this approach
would not be conducive to his professional development.
As it was, every time Mike came into Jake’s offi ce or even
walked toward him, Jake’s fi rst thought was, “What have I done
wrong?”
Mike thought silence was delegation and support. Unfortu-
nately, that silence caused everyone else to wonder, “Am I doing
OK? I haven’t heard from him lately.”
Preparing for the formal performance review with Mike was
like getting ready to testify before a congressional committee. The
event was tense because the manager was clearly in control and
obviously liked it that way. The review was a report card on past