Reducing Rater Bias

Section I Welcome 1 Section II Getting Started 3 Section III Getting Down to Business 4 Section IV Appendix 13

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1

Putting a Check on Subjectivity The purpose of this session is to make you more aware of the natural human tendency to let stereotypes and personal feelings about your employees cloud your performance evaluations. Obviously, you can’t eliminate your feelings, but you can become more aware of them and how they influence your performance as a manager. This session is designed to make you more sensitive to the issue of rater bias and show you some ways you can check your tendency to evaluate subjectively. In the first Performance Management Training module, you learned how to develop performance goals that motivate employees to excel. During the second training session, you learned techniques to coach your employees to help them achieve their specific performance goals. In this third session you will be introduced to techniques that will help you minimize subjectivity when you rate your employees’ performance. SPECIFICALLY, YOU’LL LEARN HOW TO:

¾ Identify biases to which you are particularly susceptible.

¾ Remain focused on the performance criteria in the evaluation process.

TRAINING GOALS

2

3

When people evaluate others’ work, they bring to the evaluations their own values, past experiences and ideas about what kinds of people do what kinds of things. In this sense, all of our perceptions are subjective. One reason we cannot see another person from a completely objective point of view is that we never see all the aspects of a person. You may see that an employee frequently comes in late and assume that she is not committed to the job. That assumption is the subjective part of the evaluation. You may see another employee frequently work through lunch and assume that he is very dedicated and should be considered for promotion. That assumption also is subjective. You are taking a small bit of information and using it to make a generalization about someone. You might assume that someone is dedicated when he works through lunch because that’s what you do to make sure you get all your work done. In similar fashion, our past experience with another person who is similar to the employee may affect our perceptions. Suppose you once had an employee with a loud voice and a very direct manner who alienated employees and students. You may then assume that your current loud employee is alienating others as well. Or if you have a personal belief that people with loud voices are unrefined, you may assume that the person does not have the personal qualities necessary to be a professional. Many times the assumptions we make are accurate, but other times they lead us to false conclusions. The person who comes into work late frequently may be very committed to work but have problems with her current provider of elder care. The person frequently working through lunch may simply not eat lunch and may use the extra time to socialize later with colleagues. The person with a loud voice may be very tuned in to co-worker’s needs, but may have a slight hearing loss that results in the loud voice. To avoid making mistakes about an employee’s true performance, it is important to take steps to guard against rater bias.

W h a t i s R a t e r B i a s ?

4

THE PITFALLS BETWEEN YOU AND A FAIR RATING

There are a number of kinds of bias that are common in employee performance appraisals. You may recognize some of them in yourself. By understanding what some common pitfalls are, you will become better equipped to realize

when you are heading toward one.

Initial Impression 1 This is a rating based on first impressions. It may occur when you don’t have day-to-day contact with the individual. ¾ I’ve always thought of John as being in command

because he really took charge on his first assignment when we had to redesign our information system.

Central Tendency 2 This is our tendency to rate the expected norm for all goals. In USD’s case, this bias occurs when supervisors give "Meets Expectations" ratings to all employees. This lowers the ratings of outstanding employees and raises the ratings of poorer performers. Either you believe most people meet expectations, or you don’t want to deal with the consequences of giving some people positive evaluations and some negative. You may believe that all your employees are equal, and you do not want to rock the boat. The result is a failure to reflect the true range of differences among the workers. Such ratings provide no useful information to USD or to the employees. ¾ All in all, John does what I need him to. Not an

outstanding performer; but, overall, not a slouch. Besides, we’re a very team-oriented department; everyone would expect to have their performance rated similarly because everyone works toward the same goals.

T y p e s o f R a t e r B i a s

5

3 Strict Rating

Rating consistently lower than the normal or average. Some supervisors may expect more than others from their employees. The effect is to lower the ratings of employees in one area relative to workers in other areas. If you’re a perfectionist, you may be more critical of your employees. As a result, your employees get smaller raises than employees in other areas or departments.

¾ I don’t think I should lower my standards just because this type of output would be acceptable in other departments.

4 Lenient Rating

Rating consistently higher than the expected norm or average. The effect is to hurt the superior performer. Either you’re easy to please or you feel you’ve weeded out all but the superstars from your department. This can cheapen the value of a higher rating.

¾ I've got a great group! Overall, they've got a good record of success and deserve to be rewarded with a positive rating.

The problem with both strict and lenient ratings is that a top rating given by one supervisor is not equivalent to a top rating given by another supervisor. In both cases employees feel that their rating is more of a reflection of the person who rated them rather than their actual performance.

5 Halo Effect

The halo effect involves rating an employee as excellent on one essential job function which in turn influences you to give that employee similar ratings on other functions. This often happens when the function which is rated high is especially important to the rater. You want to believe that an employee’s strength in one area carries over to other situations.

¾ John really delivered on that critical project, so I guess he must be superior in managing his people as well.

6

Horn Effect 6

Rating an employee unsatisfactory on one function, which in turn influences you to give that employee similar ratings on other functions. This happens when you give in to the simplicity of painting someone with a broad brush. ¾ Susan didn’t come through on the project when I

needed her to. I’// bet she is not a good manager of people either.

The halo and horn effects are particularly likely to occur when a high (halo) or low (horn) rating is given on one or two functions and the other functions to be rated are more difficult to measure.

Latest Behavior 7 This is a rating influenced by most recent behavior. It’s an easy trap to fall into if you haven’t been very good at taking notes about performance over the course of the appraisal period. However, recent behavior may not be typical of overall performance or may be distorted by other factors such as illness or the anticipation of the performance evaluation. ¾ It’s been seven months since Joan was instrumental in the

successful coordination of an important project. But I've forgotten that. This week she’s late on the draft of the material for a key publication. She gets a low rating.

Order of Performance Goals 8 In this situation, two or more dimensions on a performance appraisal form closely follow each other and both describe a similar quality. This results in functions rated similarly because they are close together. This often occurs because you may worry that you’ll seem inconsistent if you rate someone highly in one area and considerably lower in another. ¾ I gave Susan a "Meets Expectations" on the quality goal, a

"Meets Expectations " seems about right for the productivity standard as well.

7

9 Spillover Effect Allowing past performance appraisal ratings to unjustly influence current ratings. Not everyone is a consistent performer. In addition, an employee can become complacent, assuming he or she will get pretty much the same rating year after year. ¾ Last year John got a "Meets Expectations " overall. I think

he’d be unhappy to get a "Meets Expectations " after that; I better give him an "Outstanding " rating. Anyway, I guess he deserves it.

10 Status Effect Overrating employees in higher-level jobs or jobs held in high esteem; underrating employees in lower-level jobs or jobs held in low esteem. This could also be called the "snob effect." ¾ Anyone who can manage a group that large has to be good -

besides, Mary was recommended to me by the Director! John, on the other hand, has been in the same position for more than two years. Must be he’ s lazy and doesn't want to move up in the world.

11 Same As Me Rating higher than deserved because the person has qualities or characteristics similar to those of the rater. This is a very common pitfall. We tend to like the people we can relate to. And the more we like someone as a person, the more likely we are to rate them highly regardless of their performance. ¾ That’ s the way I would have handled that crisis - truly

brilliant!

12 Different From Me Rating lower than deserved because the person has qualities or characteristics dissimilar to those of rater. ¾ True, Martin did deliver the project successfully. But some of

that must have been luck, because he just didn’ t go about it the way I would have chosen.

8

Attribution Errors 13 When rating performance, supervisors attempt to assess not only what the level of performance was but also why the performance was at a particular level. When performance is at unusually low or high levels, the appraising supervisor tries to attribute cause to performance. Biases can emerge during the attribution process. For example, if supervisors feel that the cause of strong performance is based on great effort on the part of the employee, that worker will receive a higher performance rating than if the supervisors believe the strong performance is due to natural ability or talent. Similarly, a performance failure due to lack of sufficient effort will be judged more harshly than a failure believed to be caused by lack of ability. ¾ Even though Margaret turned in an errorless analysis, I’m not

impressed because I know that she did not spend much time working on it.

Actor-Observer Bias 14 This bias is actually another example of an attribution error. It is based on the tendency for supervisors to attribute too much of an employee’s performance to personal characteristics of the employee such as ability, effort and personality. Meanwhile, there is a tendency for the employee to attribute too much of his or her performance to situational characteristics such as luck, task difficulty, equipment and work environment. This bias illustrates that supervisors and employees have very different perspectives when assessing the employee’s performance. ¾ I'm tired of Rob’ s constant complaints that the software is producing

unreliable data; these are just excuses for his laziness.

Personal Biases 15 In addition to the above biases and errors that can affect any appraiser of work performance, the personal biases of any supervisor can also distort the accuracy of assessments. The most common personal biases are those based on the employee’s gender, race, age, sexual orientation and physical characteristics such as disabilities. Despite legislation specifically designed to ensure fairness, research suggests that women, ethnic minorities, homosexuals and individuals with disabilities continue to be discriminated against in performance appraisals. Personal biases are deeply ingrained in individuals and are therefore difficult to overcome. Because discrimination in personnel procedures has been outlawed through federal civil rights legislation, most organizations, including USD, continue to aggressively strive to prevent such biases from leading to discrimination.

10

Objective Measures Are the Key The most important thing you can do to reduce bias is to use objective measures and behaviors whenever possible. It’s as simple as that. The more objective a behavior is, the easier it is to communicate to employees. In addition, you have an outside standard to use in evaluating the performance. Take a simple example. If you say good people-management requires frequent communication, people will perceive "frequent" differently. One person will say that every couple of days is frequent, another that monthly is frequent. It depends on personality, previous experience and functional area.

By using objective measures and behaviors whenever you can, you increase the likelihood that you and your employee agree that the evaluation was fair. Of

course it’s essential that you not say: "Well, sure he completed all projects before the deadline, but that was just luck. I don’t like his attitude, so his performance doesn’t deserve to be rated more than two." Document Coaching Experiences Another check on bias is to use the coaching forms to keep regular notes on each employee, noting both positive and negative performances. The longer the time between work performance and an evaluation, the more memory loss. Without memory of the specific event, you will begin to fall back on your values and stereotypes to help you make the evaluation.

W a y s t o R e d u c e B i a s

11

Review This Module Another very important check on bias is to go over the types of biases before you do appraisals. Think about the employee. Which biases are you most susceptible to? You can then think of ways to overcome the bias. For example, if you have an employee who irritates you, you may want to be especially careful to look through notes, to solicit others’ opinions and to look for objective measures.

Employee Comparisons You may want to do a preliminary ranking of your employees into the five different performance levels. Even though you should not actually give your employees the ratings from your forced ranking, it may help you to differentiate performance levels among them. Self-Appraisals One simple and effective tool in reducing bias is the use of employee self-appraisals. This lets employees feel they have had a voice in the evaluation process and helps them take a serious look at what they’ve accomplished in the past year. Of course, employees are also biased - none of us can see ourselves objectively. You can probably predict which of your employee’s self-appraisals will be distinctly different from your appraisal of them. But the self-appraisal provides a context for discussing your differing views with your employee, so you can each explain why you see things the way you do. This process helps both of you to become more objective. A copy of the USD’s self-appraisal form may be found in the Appendix.

12

You’ve now completed this session of your performance management training. You are well on your way to becoming a more successful manager of people. Keeping rater bias in check is an essential part of any performance appraisal process. By becoming more aware of your natural tendency toward subjective evaluations, you can ensure more fair and appropriate appraisals. In the final module of this program, we’ll look at ways to conduct successful appraisal interviews.

O n e M o r e M o d u l e t o G o

Employee Self-Appraisal

Instructions This page to be completed by employee prior to the evaluation of his or her performance.

Accomplishments

Looking over the goals described in this appraisal form, what would you say are your key accomplishments this year? Opportunities for Improvement

Considering the goals on this Appraisal Form, what would you have preferred to do better? Training and Development Plan

Describe your professional development goals and how you plan to reach these goals. Also identify how your supervisor can assist in your development.