Synopses & Reviews
Do you supervise people? If so, this book is for you.
One of a managers toughestand most importantresponsibilities is to evaluate an employees performance, providing honest feedback and clarifying what theyve done well and where they need to improve.
In How to Be Good at Performance Appraisals, Dick Grote provides a concise, hands-on guide to succeeding at every step of the performance appraisal processno matter what performance management system your organization uses. Through step-by-step instructions, examples, do-and-dont bullet lists, sample dialogues, and suggested scripts, he shows you how to handle every appraisal activity from setting goals and defining job responsibilities to evaluating performance quality and discussing the performance evaluation face-to-face.
Based on decades of experience guiding managers through their biggest challenges, Grote helps answer the questions he hears most often:
How do I set goals effectively? How many goals should someone set?
How do I evaluate a persons behaviors? Which counts more, behaviors or results?
How do I determine the right performance appraisal rating? How do I explain my rating to a skeptical employee?
How do I tell someone shes not meeting my expectations? How do I deliver bad news?
Grote also explains how to tackle other thorny performance management tasks, including determining compensation and terminating poor performers.
In accessible and useful language, How to Be Good at Performance Appraisals will help you handle performance appraisals confidently and successfully, no matter the size or culture of your organization. Its the one book you need to excel at this daunting yet critical task.
Review
Grote has written a valuable guide for managers on how to appraise and improve the performance of their people.” Unlike many other books on how to improve performance, this one is down-to-earth, a model of clarity and amounts to good value for money. Managers who are facing intractable performance issues would, therefore, likely find it a very powerful work.” HR Zone
This book offers managers the skills and confidence to navigate the minefield we know as performance appraisals. More importantly, it provides the wisdom and insight that will help any leader dramatically raise the performance level of their team.” - Donald H. Brush, Ph.D., President, The Renova Corporation
Those of us who are so fortunate to have worked with Dick Grote know that when he promises How to Be Good at Performance Appraisals: Simple, Effective, Done Right, we can expect solid advice based on real-life experience that actually works! Highly recommended to all managers!” - Thomas Sohns, HR Director, Novo Nordisk; Business Area Africa, Gulf and India
Great tips and thoughts about how to do effective performance appraisals. A mandatory read for any manager who does performance appraisals.” - Edward Lawler, author of Talent: Making People Your Competitive Advantage and Professor, Marshall School of Business, University of Southern California.
Almost every manager on the planet struggles with the task of conducting performance appraisals. Finally, there is a practical guide based both on research and business best practices that provides enough advice and how-to steps to successfully guide any manager through the appraisal process.” - John Sullivan, Ph.D., Professor of Management, San Francisco State University
Dick Grote has been working as a change agent in the C-suite of some of the worlds greatest companies for as long as I can remember. In his book How to Be Good at Performance Appraisals, he takes his expertise a step further. To say it plainly: this isnt a book for the C-suite; its for anyone who manages people.” - Anne Ruddy, CCP, CPCU; and President, WorldatWork
Synopsis
If you're an executive, manager, or team leader, one of your toughest responsibilities is managing your people's performance. How do you appraise just how well a direct report has carried out her job? What do you do if informal coaching fails to improve mediocre performance?
In How to be Good at Performance Appraisals Dick Grote provides a concise, hands-on guide to succeeding at every task required by your company's performance appraisal and management process. Through step-by-step instructions, examples, sample dialogues, and suggested scripts, he shows you how to handle appraisal activities ranging from setting goals, defining job responsibilities, and coaching to providing recognition, assessing performance and discussing it with employees, and creating development plans.
Grote also explains how to tackle other performance management activities your company requires, such as determining compensation, developing and retaining star performers, and solving people problems.
This book is so accessible and practical that you won't just read it once and put it away. Instead, you'll be sure to keep it within arm's reach, referring to particular chapters each time you face a performance management task.
About the Author
Dick Grote is Chairman and CEO of Grote Consulting Corporation in Dallas,Texas. He is an expert in performance management and author of The Complete Guide to Performance Appraisal, The Performance Appraisal Question and Answer Book, and Discipline Without Punishment. He has been a regular commentator on workplace issues on NPR's Morning Edition program, and his articles have appeared in Harvard Business Review, The Wall Street Journal and other business and HR magazines and journals.