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Managing Performance Appraisal Review Cycles

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LightWork® Software
Managing Performance Appraisal Review Cycles
Managing Performance Appraisal Review Cycles

 

There are two schools of thought on review dates. The first school believes that employees should be reviewed on a yearly basis, at the anniversary of their employment. This method staggers the reviews of employees over the course of any given year. The second school believes that employees should all be reviewed once per year, at the same time, regardless of when they joined the organization.

 

Most experts now agree that, except in the case of new employees, one annual review for all employees is the more beneficial approach. The benefits of reviewing all employees at the same time are:

  • Consistency: When managers are required to review all employees during the same time period, it eliminates bias from the review process. If each employee were reviewed throughout the year on an anniversary date, the mood of the manager (either positive or negative), might affect the performance evaluation.

  • Compensation: Reviewing employees all at the same time (preferably at the end of the organization’s fiscal year), makes planning compensation easier. This is especially true if the organization intends on ranking employees by a review “score” and then recommending compensation increases and promotions based on those scores.

  • Momentum: No matter when reviews happen, they take a considerable amount of manager time and energy. When the review requirements are spread out throughout the year, review dates have a tendency to slip. When they occur all at the same time, with an organization-mandated deadline, the reviews are more likely to be completed.

Perhaps the only time not to complete an annual, all-at-one-time review is in the case of new employees. It is a good policy to review a new employee after the first three or six months. That employee should still be reviewed with the rest of the employees at year-end, with the interim acting as a supporting document.

 

When you implement PAM Web, the performance appraisal management cycle can be determined by individual employee, by group, or by company. A performance appraisal software like PAM will start the review process on the schedule that you determine.


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