Microsoft recently announced that it was finally ditching a much-maligned “stack ranking” system.
Last summer, Vanity Fair did much to publicize how demoralizing the system was. The magazine learned that managers had for years been obliged to rank team members on a curve — such that some employees in each team had to be lowest-ranked, even if every team member excelled. Much like getting an F in math for scoring “only” 98 percent on an exam when everybody else manages 99 or 100 percent.
One consequence: Microsoft employees proved reluctant to transfer to crews where their ranking might slip no matter how consistently stellar their performance. “Better,” however galling, to clutch to a top rank on a marginal team than risk a low rank on a powerhouse team. Thus, what counted as “better” in the stack ranking clashed with what was in fact better with respect both to individual achievement and the company’s overall achievement.
Clearly, even the most successful private firms can make pretty big, pretty dumb mistakes. Yet when officers do realize how bad a policy is, they also can often make a 180-degree course change, fast.
How different when it comes to politics-stultified government (or quasi-government) outfits like FDA, USPS, Amtrak, and the growing agglomeration of health-care agencies. Year after year, decade after decade, the same blunders persist, the same red ink spills. In the political realm, political incentives set the terms. And nobody is free to simply discontinue all the glaringly bad incentives.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
4 replies on “Turnabout Is Fairer Play”
They are free to discontinue bad policies, but there is no incentive to do so. It is like the human appendix. Probably once served a purpose. Will now persist forever as long as there is no negative niche pressure. Since the carrying cost gets covered anyway, once something is developed in government, it is immortal.
I agree with Mr. Jacobs and Drik. A better example (I consider the USPS necessary, incidentally) BUT CONSIDER THE REA.
Started in the early 1930’s, to provide electricity to rural and unserviced areas. Yet today, is there any INHABITABLE area of the US without electricity?
And the nobama administration going into competition to provide wi-fi service to areas?
This should end. And off topic, rather then cut MILITARY PENSIONS, WHY NOT CUT CONGRESSIONAL PERKS AND PENSIONS. THE MILITARY SERVES A GOOD PURPOSE. CONGRESS DOES NOT.
The problem I saw in rating government employees at a VA medical center was the opposite as Microsoft’s problem. A mediocre rating had minimal negative effects on an employee. A single poor rating also had few negative effects: it took three or four poor ratings in a row to trigger the lengthy and difficult task of getting the poor performer fired. Attempts to change this system went nowhere: the rules had to be negotiated with the public employee unions. Unions, for unknown reasons, fight to prevent poor workers from being fired. But, that hurts the coworkers who have to pick up the slack. A sensible union would ensure that the evaluation system is sensible, and then support dismissal of bad apples. But, there’s no evidence that unions act logically.
The Air Force used to do this for Officer Effectiveness Reports. Every officer who was rating subordinates was required to rate them on a curve. The problem arose with “elite” units. You had to be head and shoulders above the rest even to get in, but the rater still had to put his/her subordinates on a curve. It wasn’t fair to anyone involved.