Performance Reviews are Broken

I’ve spent the past few months speaking to HR leaders, managers, and individual contributors to get their perspective. To be honest, I’m wondering where Gallup found the 5 percent.

The current performance review model is nothing short of broken. It’s bias-ridden, time-consuming, and outcomes are far from actionable enough.

Focusing on the Major Biases: Recency and Gender

I won’t cover all the biases that are common in performance reviews in this article, but I do want to focus on two significant ones: recency bias and gender bias.

Recency Bias

Assessing performance on an annual, or even semi-annual basis just isn’t enough. It leaves long periods where performance is barely discussed, building frustration, insecurity, and ultimately this enormous pressure once performance review season is finally upon us. And to top it all off, you have to be on top of your game just when it happens. The problem is that performance just doesn’t work like that. Humans don’t work like that. We have ups and downs throughout a year, and relying on 1-2 performance assessments per year just doesn’t cut it.

Gender Bias

Let’s face it, we’re far from living in an equal opportunity workplace, and almost all performance evaluations leave far too much room for bias. Time and time again, the 360 review model has been shown to be prone to gender bias. Women tend to receive more vague feedback, and also feedback related to perceived confidence or emotions. And it doesn’t help that the infamous “calibration” or “talent review” meetings that are supposed to sense-check reviews, seem to add to the bias.

Modern Approaches to Mitigate Bias

Now let’s take a look at what our “neighbors” in Talent Acquisition are doing to combat bias in candidate evaluation.

• Mechanical Assessment: A meta-study conducted by Kuncel, Klieger, Connelly, and Ones in 2013 demonstrated significant benefits of mechanical assessments. These assessments use algorithms or formulas to aggregate scores, which improved the prediction of performance by over 50%. This method was compared to intuitive or holistic scoring, where decisions are made based on personal expertise and intuition.
• Structured interviews: Have proven to be a method that provides higher validity, with greater accuracy, less subjectivity, and improved fairness in the hiring process. The structured process of creating a fair, and equal process for everyone makes it easier to compare candidates, while ensuring that nothing is missed.
• Behavioral anchors: Another commonly used method in hiring, that highly supports the above-mentioned structure, and mechanical assessment is the use of Behaviorally Anchored Rating Scales (BARS) to combat specific biases in the process.

Conclusion: Transforming Performance Reviews at Asaya Labs

It’s evident that traditional performance reviews are outdated and often biased. At Asaya Labs, we’re inspired to adopt proven Talent Acquisition strategies—like mechanical assessments, structured interviews, and behavioral anchors—to revolutionize our approach. These methods promise not only to reduce biases but also to enhance the accuracy and fairness of performance evaluations.

Our commitment is clear: transform performance reviews from a dreaded ritual into a continuous, efficient, and actionable process. We’re hoping to set a new standard for fairness and effectiveness, ensuring every team member is recognized for their true contributions.

Interested to know more? Sign up to our waitlist here. Together, we’re not just changing the game; we’re changing how we play it.