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Why Performance Reviews Fail (And How to Actually Make Them Fair) · The Science of Leading

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  Welcome back to The Science of Leading.
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  I'm Claire, and I'm here with Edwin Carrington.
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  Today we're talking about something almost everyone quietly dreads at
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  work... performance reviews.
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  Yes, the annual ritual of anxiety.
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  Exactly.
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  And what I wanna dig into is... why do so many reviews feel off?
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  Like, you walk out thinking, "That didn't really describe my work... but
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  it still affects my future."You're describing the core problem.
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  Reviews quietly define "what good looks like." They tell people: this
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  is what gets rewarded, this is what gets ignored.
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  If that message is sloppy or inconsistent,
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  people lose trust very quickly.
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  So even if leaders don't say it out loud,
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  the review is where the organization decides,
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  "We care about outcomes" or "We care about optics."That's right.
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  When reviews are vague, political,
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  or based on memory, employees learn that performance doesn't matter as
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  much as being visible, or being liked.
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  That crushes engagement.
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  And your best people... they eventually leave.
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  Let's name the biggest landmines.
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  You talk a lot about recency bias.
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  Can you explain that in plain terms?
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  Recency bias is when the last few
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  weeks become the whole story.
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  A person can do solid work for nine months,
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  then miss one deadline in the last month,
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  and suddenly the review is, "You struggle with follow-through." It's
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  not fair, but it's very human.
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  And the opposite happens too,
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  right?
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  One great project in Q4 and everything else gets washed away.
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  Exactly.
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  That connects to the halo and horns effect.
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  One strong trait, or one big mistake,
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  colors every area.
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  "You're great with clients, so you must be great at time management."
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  Or, "You dropped the ball once,
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  so you must be unreliable in general."Hmm.
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  So instead of, "Your communication was rough in this one launch," it
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  becomes, "You're bad at communication,
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  full stop."Right.
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  And then we layer on personality judgments.
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  Labels like "not a culture fit," "too quiet," "too intense." None of
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  those say anything about observable behavior.
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  They're just... manager feelings.
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  Why do you think so many leaders slip
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  into that?
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  Is it laziness, or just not having language for what they're seeing?
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  Often
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  it's a lack of structure.
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  If you don't have a framework,
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  you default to personality.
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  "I enjoy working with this person,
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  therefore they're strong." Or,
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  "They irritate me, therefore they're weak." We confuse effort with outcomes.
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  "They stay late, they must be high performers." Maybe.
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  Or maybe they're fixing avoidable mistakes.
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  So "works hard" becomes a
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  stand‑in for "delivers results," even if there's no evidence.
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  I've definitely heard, "She has such a great attitude," used as a reason
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  to rate someone highly, with zero mention of actual deliverables.
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  Yes.
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  Effort is only useful when it leads to something: better quality,
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  faster delivery, fewer escalations,
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  stronger collaboration.
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  Otherwise we're just rewarding busyness.
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  Okay,
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  let's flip this.
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  If we're not centering reviews on personality or vibes,
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  what do we center them on?
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  On shared team goals.
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  Start with: what did this team exist to do in this timeframe?
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  Delivery: did we meet the right deadlines.
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  Quality: did we reduce rework and complaints.
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  Collaboration: did handoffs go smoothly.
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  Improvement: did we actually learn and fix recurring issues.
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  So instead
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  of, "Ed is great to work with," it becomes,
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  "Ed improved our on‑time delivery by cleaning up handoffs between product
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  and support." Still human, but grounded.
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  Exactly.
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  First define the outcomes, then evaluate individuals and the team against
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  those outcomes.
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  That's where tools like OAD can help as well-bringing in fast,
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  validated personality data so you understand someone's natural style.
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  But that data is there to explain patterns and tailor development,
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  not to replace evidence about results.
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  That's an important distinction.
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  Personality data should support a fair review,
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  not become another excuse for bias.
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  "Well, the assessment says you're not a team player..." No thank you.
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  Precisely.
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  The goal is very simple: people should see a clear line between what
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  they did, the impact it had, and what the organization values next cycle.
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  When you get that wrong, you don't just have a bad meeting-you damage
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  trust and retention.
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  Alright, so in the next part,
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  let's get specific about how to turn those vague "vibes" into actual
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  evidence in a review.
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  So Edwin, if I'm a manager listening to this,
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  I might be thinking, "Okay, I get the problem... but what does a fair review
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  actually look like on paper?"Let's build it from the ground up.
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  A useful review has a few core pieces.
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  First: role and scope.
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  What is this job actually responsible for,
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  and who are the key stakeholders-customers,
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  other teams, direct reports.
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  So you're not rating someone on expectations
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  you never wrote down.
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  Exactly.
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  Second: goals and outcomes for the timeframe.
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  What was expected, what was delivered,
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  and what changed.
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  If priorities shifted three times,
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  write that down-don't quietly punish people for leadership thrash.
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  Then
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  we get into competencies, right?
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  Work ethic, time management, problem solving,
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  communication, collaboration... those kinds of buckets.
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  Yes.
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  Keep the list small and relevant.
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  Under each competency, you need evidence: specific examples,
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  work artifacts like tickets or project docs,
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  and any meaningful metrics.
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  Finally, you apply a simple rating scale on top-a 3‑point or 5‑point
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  scale with clear definitions.
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  Let's talk about swapping those fuzzy phrases.
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  Take "not a team player." How do we rewrite that in a way that's actually
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  helpful?
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  We translate it into behavior and impact.
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  For example: "Did not share status updates on Project X,
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  which led to missed handoffs and rework for the support team." That's
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  observable.
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  You can agree or disagree with the example,
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  but at least you can see it.
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  And on the positive side,
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  "great attitude" becomes something like,
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  "When deadlines slipped in March,
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  you stayed solution‑focused and helped coordinate a recovery plan that
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  kept the launch within the quarter."Exactly.
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  There's nothing wrong with being pleasant to work with.
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  Just tie it to outcomes.
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  Did their behavior improve delivery,
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  quality, or collaboration.
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  What about artifacts?
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  You mentioned tickets and docs.
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  How much of that should show up in a review?
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  Enough that someone outside
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  the team could follow the story.
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  "Here's the project doc you led,
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  here's the customer feedback, here's the before-and-after defect rate."
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  It doesn't have to be a novel, but it can't just be,
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  "Trust me, they're great."Okay,
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  rating scales.
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  People love to argue about 3‑point versus 5‑point.
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  How do you think about that?
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  If you need speed and you don't have strong
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  calibration habits, use three: Needs improvement,
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  Meets expectations, Exceeds expectations.
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  If you're ready for more nuance,
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  a 5‑point scale can work, but you must define what a 4 and a 5 look like
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  in behavior.
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  Otherwise, everyone becomes a 4.
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  And that's where behavioral anchors come
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  in, right?
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  Like, for time management, a "3" might be "Consistently meets deadlines
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  and communicates tradeoffs," and a "5" might be "Improves team planning
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  systems and reduces recurring delays."Yes.
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  Anchors turn the scale from a mood meter into a tool.
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  Then you run calibration: managers compare ratings with evidence,
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  first within a department, then across departments.
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  You're looking for patterns-one manager who rates everyone as "exceptional,"
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  another who never gives above "meets expectations."Hmm... So calibration
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  is basically, "Are we all using this scale the same way?"Exactly.
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  And this is another place where behavioral data from something like the
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  OAD Survey can be helpful.
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  If you know a manager tends to avoid conflict,
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  for example, you might expect them to inflate ratings.
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  Or if a role needs a very specific behavioral profile,
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  you can check whether the expectations you're setting line up with how
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  that person is wired-and tailor development instead of just slapping on
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  a low score.
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  So you're not using OAD to label people,
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  you're using it to ask better questions during calibration and to make
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  coaching more precise.
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  Exactly.
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  You still come back to the same rule: every rating must connect to
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  evidence-examples,
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  artifacts, and impact on team goals.
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  The structure isn't there to make HR happy.
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  It's there to make the system fair and understandable.
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  Alright,
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  next I wanna ask: once you've collected all this evidence and put in
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  the ratings... how do you turn that into actual growth,
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  not just a score?
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  We've talked about what a good review looks like.
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  Now let's talk about the part that usually breaks down: turning that
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  feedback into real improvement.
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  Yes.
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  Many companies stop at, "Here's your rating,
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  see you next year." A review without a development plan is just a history
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  lesson.
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  So what does a concrete development plan actually include?
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  Because I see a lot of "Work on communication" with no specifics.
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  You
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  need three things.
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  One: a single focus area, not a shopping list.
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  Work ethic, time management, problem solving,
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  or communication-pick one.
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  Two: observable behaviors.
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  "Provide weekly status updates," "Summarize decisions after meetings,"
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  "Flag blockers within 24 hours." Three: checkpoints with dates.
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  So instead
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  of "Get better at time management," it becomes,
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  "For the next 60 days, share weekly priorities,
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  agree on deadlines, and hit those dates on two key projects."Exactly.
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  And you define what success looks like.
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  "No last‑minute surprises for stakeholders on Project A and B." That
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  makes the conversation in the next review cycle very clear-did it happen
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  or not.
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  Where do follow‑ups come in?
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  Because if you only talk about this a year later,
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  it's already too late.
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  You need a rhythm.
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  Quarterly check‑ins to talk goals and blockers.
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  A mid‑year review that looks more deeply at performance and the development
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  plan.
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  Then an annual review mainly for compensation and promotion,
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  using all that prior evidence.
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  That cadence reduces recency bias and almost eliminates "surprise" feedback.
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  And
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  in between, you're doing short,
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  practical check‑ins.
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  "How are the status updates going?
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  Are we still seeing last‑minute rework,
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  or has it dropped?"Exactly.
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  And again, if you have something like OAD in the mix,
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  you can make those plans more tailored.
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  If you know someone is naturally low‑detail,
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  for example, you might keep their time‑management plan very simple and
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  build in visual tools, instead of just saying,
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  "Be more organized." You're aligning development with how they're actually
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  wired.
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  So we've got structure, cadence,
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  and behavioral insight all working together.
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  Before we wrap, could we give managers a quick checklist for their next
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  review cycle?
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  Let's do it.
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  Here's a simple one.
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  One: Set the timeframe clearly-"We're reviewing from January 1st to March
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  31st"-and require evidence from inside that window.
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  Two: Start with team goals.
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  What were the top three outcomes this team owned: delivery,
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  quality, collaboration, improvement.
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  Three: For each person,
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  define their role and scope in writing.
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  What are they actually on the hook for,
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  and who are their key stakeholders.
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  Four: Use a small set of competencies-work
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  ethic, time management, problem solving,
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  communication and collaboration.
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  For each one, gather at least two specific examples and any relevant
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  metrics or artifacts.
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  Five: Apply a simple rating scale-3‑point or 5‑point-with
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  behavioral anchors.
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  No rating without evidence.
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  If you can't back it up, you can't score it.
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  Six: Run calibration.
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  Compare ratings across managers,
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  look for drift, and adjust based on evidence,
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  not hierarchy.
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  Seven: Turn every constructive point into a development plan: one focus
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  area, clear behaviors, and 30‑,
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  60‑, 90‑day checkpoints.
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  Eight: Lock in the follow‑up rhythm.
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  Quarterly check‑ins, a mid‑year review,
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  and an annual review that summarizes,
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  instead of inventing a new story.
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  And nine: Keep asking,
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  "Would a reasonable person see this process as fair?" If not,
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  adjust.
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  Because fairness is what protects trust,
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  engagement, and retention over time.
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  I love that.
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  And if you wanna add a behavioral layer that doesn't slow everything
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  down, this is where something like the OAD Survey can be really powerful-fast
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  data on how people naturally work,
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  so your reviews and development plans are grounded in both behavior and
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  results.
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  Well put.
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  When you combine clear goals, real evidence,
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  structured ratings, and good behavioral insight,
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  reviews stop being rituals and start being levers for performance and
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  growth.
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  Alright, we're gonna leave it there for today.
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  Edwin, as always, thank you for the wisdom.
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  Always a pleasure,
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  Claire.
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  And for those listening, remember: structure isn't bureaucracy.
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  It's how you show people you're paying attention.
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  If you want to see how
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  OAD performs on your own roles and candidates,
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  test OAD for free at OAD.
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  ai.
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  Thanks for listening to The Science of Leading.
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  Edwin, talk to you next time.
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  Looking forward to it.
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  Goodbye everyone.