Designing an Engineering Performance Management System from Scratch • Hacker News Board

Re: Designing an Engineering Performance Management System from Scratch

#31

Post by all2 » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 8:57 PM UTC

shadester88 wrote: post #29

I find the obsession with performance reviews interesting. I manage teams of developers in a large organisation, and I have been doing so for many years now. I hate performance reviews. I think they do not achieve what people think they do, they take up a lot of time and effort to decide and perform, and they often have quite a negative effect on the staff member. I think performance reviews and KPIs for individuals…

My gut tells me that these metrics are in place because upper management does not trust you to be objective or consistent when it comes to your people. Rather than actually trust your judgement, they give you a checklist and tell you to check the boxes.

Along with a lack of trust, there's also the need for a paper trail in some states if it comes down to firing someone who needs firing. Without an appropriate paper trail the company would be on the hook for paying that individual's unemployment.

I'm not saying you're wrong. In fact, I think you are right. Most people will rise to the expectations set for them (or fall, according to the expectations set).

Re: Designing an Engineering Performance Management System from Scratch

#32

Post by dunkelheit » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 9:01 PM UTC

emtel wrote: post #13

Formal performance reviews are the worst method for evaluating your workforce that has ever been tried, except for all the others. For me, performance reviews are the single most demoralizing aspect of working at a large company. They are doubly demoralizing because I can see so many things wrong with them, but also can't imagine any system that would work better. So what's wrong with them? 1. Over the long term, the…

Good summary. For me the triply demoralizing factor is that (at least where I work) performance reviews are hugely hypocritical. There are some officially stated rules but they don't describe what is actually happening. E.g. officially admitting that there is any kind of stack ranking is a big no-no, but there is now way a team leader can get away with "well, every one on my team has exceeded expectations this year, give them all raises". Or the term "exceeds expectations" itself - actual expectations of your boss play little role compared to the perceived importance of your work.

All of this is a kind of open secret, so the system is "fair" for some definition of fairness. Still, a novice will spend a couple of cycles to understand the unwritten rules of the game. At this point they will either start playing by the real rules or recoil in horror and suffer a blow to their motivation. Of course staying ignorant is also a possibility.

Re: Designing an Engineering Performance Management System from Scratch

#33

Post by shadester88 » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 9:05 PM UTC

all2 wrote: post #31

shadester88 wrote: post #29

I find the obsession with performance reviews interesting. I manage teams of developers in a large organisation, and I have been doing so for many years now. I hate performance reviews. I think they do not achieve what people think they do, they take up a lot of time and effort to decide and perform, and they often have quite a negative effect on the staff member. I think performance reviews and KPIs for individuals…

My gut tells me that these metrics are in place because upper management does not trust you to be objective or consistent when it comes to your people. Rather than actually trust your judgement, they give you a checklist and tell you to check the boxes. Along with a lack of trust, there's also the need for a paper trail in some states if it comes down to firing someone who needs firing. Without an appropriate paper t…

You are correct in assuming the fact that you need a paper trail to fire someone. I work in Australia and firing someone for poor performance requires a fair bit of work.

But for performance management, I basically have to put them on a performance management plan and set expectations. If they fail to regularly meet those expectations, then they can be let go. This generally takes a few months to progress through, giving the staff member the opportunity to prove us wrong.

But this process is very different to KPIs. An important one, nonetheless.

Re: Designing an Engineering Performance Management System from Scratch

#34

Post by draw_down » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 9:25 PM UTC

What I've run into is that the evaluation works the same even if your situation doesn't match up with what's assumed by the evaluation.

The evaluation assumes you are part of a staffed, functioning team, with a manager who is actively engaged in what you're working on and can help you navigate the organization to achieve things. But if you're by yourself, working under a manager whose "real job" is something totally different and thus has no time for you, the evaluation amounts to a farce.

Sadly for you in this case, the organization must feign "objectivity" and so there's no way to admit that for your case the evaluation doesn't make sense. Or to put it another way, the organization is interested in evaluating you, but uninterested in evaluating itself, ie, the extent to which it provides an environment you can succeed in. They didn't hold up their end of the bargain but still expect you to hold your end.

And if you're senior enough, they will turn all this back around on you as problems you should be proactive in solving. So not only do they evaluate how you "perform" in the middle of a big mess they made, they're expecting you to clean up the mess at the same time, with no credit.

It sucks. It's demoralizing, and really makes the whole process feel like a sham.

Re: Designing an Engineering Performance Management System from Scratch

#35

Post by johan_larson » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 9:36 PM UTC

emtel wrote: post #13

Formal performance reviews are the worst method for evaluating your workforce that has ever been tried, except for all the others. For me, performance reviews are the single most demoralizing aspect of working at a large company. They are doubly demoralizing because I can see so many things wrong with them, but also can't imagine any system that would work better. So what's wrong with them? 1. Over the long term, the…

I've seen various performance management systems at eight different employers now. My conclusions:

1. Some feedback is useful. Sometimes it's hard to be sure how you're doing, particularly if you're not super-sensitive socially.

2. More is not better. Once a year is plenty.

3. It's mostly subjective. Trying to draw clear lines is probably a waste of time. A very experienced organization may be able to create some guidelines, but they should be guidelines, not rules.

4. In the end it's all about whether you are making the boss happy. The only reason to involve anyone other than you two in the process is when some of your work is genuinely out of view of the boss.

Re: Designing an Engineering Performance Management System from Scratch

#36

Post by pbecotte » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 9:50 PM UTC

kelnos wrote: post #22

Cookingboy wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>if 100% of the engineers are operating at say Staff Engineer level Then you need to re-evaluate your definition of "Staff Engineer" at your company. Those titles are all relatively defined internally in the first place, just like junior/senior/staff/senior staff. There is no industry-wide benchmark for those levels, so an internal curve is the only system that makes sense. In the imaginary case where everyone in the…

If everyone actually is operating at a high level -- or at least enough to make a curve difficult -- keeping people under-titled is just a great way to allow your high performers to become discouraged and leave the company.

Titles, in my mind, reflect duties and responsibility rather then level. Not everyone can be in charge of the same things and have leadership responsibilities...therefore they cant all be staff engineer.

They CAN all be top performers at their responsibility list...

Re: Designing an Engineering Performance Management System from Scratch

#37

Post by walshemj » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 9:53 PM UTC

emtel wrote: post #13

Formal performance reviews are the worst method for evaluating your workforce that has ever been tried, except for all the others. For me, performance reviews are the single most demoralizing aspect of working at a large company. They are doubly demoralizing because I can see so many things wrong with them, but also can't imagine any system that would work better. So what's wrong with them? 1. Over the long term, the…

No all PMS systems are worse that say giving every one the same pay rise even a lottery would cause less disruption.

Re: Designing an Engineering Performance Management System from Scratch

#38

Post by munchbunny » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 9:53 PM UTC

johnrob wrote: post #12

Fundamentally, are performance systems done objectively or "on a curve"? Meaning, if 100% of the engineers are operating at say Staff Engineer level, do they all end up with that title? Or does the Staff Engineer title really come down to some sort of percentile in a stack ranking?

if 100% of the engineers are operating at say Staff Engineer level, do they all end up with that title? Or does the Staff Engineer title really come down to some sort of percentile in a stack ranking?

If you actually have 100% of engineers operating at the Staff Engineer level, then it is what it is. However, the only case I can think of when that should ever be true is when you can count your developers on one hand. Once you grow any bigger, it's just not an efficient use of your money or the engineers' time to have that much experience concentration (as opposed to talent concentration, since more junior people can be talented too).

Re: Designing an Engineering Performance Management System from Scratch

#39

Post by walshemj » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 9:55 PM UTC

all2 wrote: post #31

shadester88 wrote: post #29

I find the obsession with performance reviews interesting. I manage teams of developers in a large organisation, and I have been doing so for many years now. I hate performance reviews. I think they do not achieve what people think they do, they take up a lot of time and effort to decide and perform, and they often have quite a negative effect on the staff member. I think performance reviews and KPIs for individuals…

My gut tells me that these metrics are in place because upper management does not trust you to be objective or consistent when it comes to your people. Rather than actually trust your judgement, they give you a checklist and tell you to check the boxes. Along with a lack of trust, there's also the need for a paper trail in some states if it comes down to firing someone who needs firing. Without an appropriate paper t…

No its really because:

1 In order for hr to justify themselves.

2 As a hypocritical way to cut the pay quanta.

Re: Designing an Engineering Performance Management System from Scratch

#40

Post by geofft » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 10:06 PM UTC

johnrob wrote: post #12

Fundamentally, are performance systems done objectively or "on a curve"? Meaning, if 100% of the engineers are operating at say Staff Engineer level, do they all end up with that title? Or does the Staff Engineer title really come down to some sort of percentile in a stack ranking?

For almost any company, if 100% of your engineers are senior, you're overpaying for talent (and probably burning out some talent, too) because not all the work that needs to be done is senior-level work.

This is not the same thing as 100% of your engineers being good, by any means, so it's not quite a stack ranking problem. In particular you can solve it by hiring good junior people, as long as you're not overstaffed (and if you are overstaffed, you need to find a way to figure out who to get rid of, other than getting rid of all the junior people).