Time to Fire Performance Review? Not on Your Life!

An article interviewing Samuel Culbert, the author of a new book, "Get Rid of the Performance Review", was in our local newspaper 2 days ago. Although a very passionate person, I have seldom felt so outraged as by this book. As with so many good things, Mr. Culbert "throws the baby out with the bath water" in his effort to be politically correct.

To be fair he does espouse several things with which I agree; we'll cover those now.

First, he encourages dialogue, and he wants management to take responsibility for productivity, which is more than fair, if the individual is accountable for their job performance as well. More on this later.

Secondly, employees should have a big part in how the assignment is accomplished, and share that with their superior. A consensus can be reached, and therefore they're in it together. Total agreement here.

Thirdly, Professor Culbert implies that management is at fault for not getting involved enough. Once again I agree here; management must "roll up its sleeves", assist positively, and foster joint accountability. Definitely true, but also more comments are required, and will come later.

Finally, he implies that Performance Reviews are used for "companies to justify firings & layoffs." He further states, "If people aren't learning the lessons implied by the mistakes they're making, it will be obvious and easy enough to get them out the door and on the road. You don't need a checklist for that." Wow; he is really out of touch here. It makes me wonder how long it's been since he has been in an actual workplace.

To respond, let me start from the top. The uppermost problem in ALL of the workplace now is accountability. Yes, management must be accountable, but so must the individual. The only way this is accomplished is to MUTUALLY agree upon goals, measure them, and then evaluate the results. Certainly much of this is handled in regular and candid one to ones, constructive feedback, and coaching, but at some point, the goal has been achieved or it hasn't. If it has, then mutually celebrate, if it hasn't, what needs to be changed, funded, or approached uniquely to succeed? Still at some point, there has been success or failure, or somewhere in between. We learn and move forward, but we do need a record of how we did, all of us, management included.

As for management "rolling up their sleeves", I'm in favor of that, but "joint accountability" does not mean management takes the blame, and the non-performing employee skates. Management must get results, but so must individuals.

Sadly, Professor Culbert believes employers are the bad guys, lurking around with their performance reviews, just waiting to catch someone fouling up so they can fire them. Nothing can be farther from the truth. Good companies know that excellent employees are very hard to find, and therefore want to the utmost to take care of them.

Certainly, in hard times such as we've seen recently, employers, when faced with layoffs to reduce cost, will choose many from the poorest performers. If this is wrong, from where should they better choose ? If the answer is seniority, can you accurately tell me that it is better for the company to choose by tenure which will include some of the best performers? Wouldn't you like to keep your best? Isn't this better for the future of the company and jobs?

A final note. The author made the grand point of stating that it's easy to get non-performers out the door. Where has he been? Does he see his non-performing but tenured peers at UCLA let go? How much documentation (rightfully so) does it require to fire any given worker in management OR from the ranks?

Let's keep the Performance Appraisal, but let's do it right, and win together.

Should Give & Take be Give & Receive?

Those of you who follow my articles know that I admire Ichak Adizes. He is an international lecturer & consultant with not only great insights, but values.

He was lecturing recently about trust in the marketplace. He had emphasized a tough but fair approach, and one that would truly be a win-win for each party. You'd expect this of him, but what was unique, was that at the end of the talk, he was approached by a man who gave him an interesting thought: Shouldn't give and take be give and receive?

This was very fascinating to Ichak, and is so to me as well.

Certainly, we would agree (on paper at least) that we shouldn't, in good faith, just grab what we can, if we can. Rather, it might be inferred, might we expect to receive something in return, IF we are gracious in our approach? This makes sense, but it might be a bit soft for some of us when in tough negotiations; would we really get what we expected in return?

However, this wasn't the man's point. He said that taking is easy (probably for we type A's), but receiving is hard. Hmm, something to think about. One has to be willing to acknowledge what was given. There is emotion in receiving, and perhaps even a concession that the other has been fair, or even compassionate with you.

How do your challengers (negotiators) feel about you? Does it matter? Are you a better of worse negotiator for receiving rather than taking?

Can we REALLY Make Money in Digital Print?

I remember more than 10 years ago, when in the company I would later run, as VP Sales, recommending that we begin the journey into digital print. At the time, we were printing (UV offset) overhead transparencies for the Educational Publishing market.

College publishers served the professors at the universities who wrote the books being printed. And the professors wanted the transparencies as teaching aids for their lectures. So to secure the book business, the publishers provided the overheads, usually at no cost, to the authors.

The big challenge was to improve the service to the professors while decreasing the cost (which ate into the publishers' profit). We provided a solution. With the aid of our pre-press & IT persons, a consultant wrote software for us to attach to the publisher's website. Meanwhile, we digitized/prepared the files with the publisher. What resulted was that the professor could go to the publisher's website, & choose not only which slides she wanted, but in the order she wanted. Delivery was in about 4 days (quite good back then!)

Meanwhile, we had grouped several Printronix printers (a blast from the past) and tied them to what was then an Indigo (now HP) press. We also constructed a climate controlled work area for not only the press, but finishing equipment like drilling, cutting, and wrapping. The collation sequence was handled in the software we created with H/P.

We would then summary bill the publisher monthly, which was very clean while reducing expense since the professor only ordered what she wanted. Previously, they were ordering the whole set, which could be as many as 200.

Did we make money? Yes we did. Not a lot, due to the learning curve, build out, and custom software.

But it did 2 very critical things for us: 1) It got us in the game way before 99% of the marketplace. This would eventually grow into expanded digital production for book components (covers and jackets), and other classroom materials. Eventually we had H/P, Xerox, and Kodak presses and an exemplary understanding of the workflow and marketplace.

Secondly, and just as importantly, it secured a great deal of additional business because we could serve all of the customer needs. If we got the digital portion, we would get the offset as well, and vice-versa. We also got the jobs at a higher gross profit level because our competition couldn't do the same.

What's to learn from this bit of history? Well, it's the same now, really. It's a bit scary, it's a challenge, but the winners will jump in and start the learning process. When you do things that others cannot, or will not, do, you win; it's that simple. Hire and develop good people, and together you will discover the right course of action!

Content Aggregation

Content Aggregation is defined as: "Bringing together content from multiple sources for retrieval at a later time," In the broader sense, it means taking care of the content, from one source or many, and being able to store & output it to a variety of "delivery" methods.

Previously, I stressed the importance of it to the future of Print. So it makes sense to take an even larger look at it. I believe Content Aggregation is the key to profitability as we look to our future. More on making money later.

But for the time being,for the sake of this article, let's assume I'm wrong. What if we spend time and money on learning the workflow & delivery methods & this whole digital thing is overblown? I submit that we would still be in much better shape to face the future than if we ignored it.

Here's why. To really become knowledgeable, we must immerse ourselves in it. This does not mean simply outsourcing digital print, but developing IT people, and assembling a strong pre-press group. As you involve Customer Service, Sales, and the Marketing folks, you will discover what your customers want and need, possible niches, and how to move forward.

This is how futures are developed in the face of technology. I love it when we let our most competent people guide us. Great leadership is listening to your employees & customers, and going where they take you!

Are We Printers, or Content Deliverers?

As the Digital Workflow increasingly influences our print market, one thing becomes quite apparent: We are no longer simply printers. We will certainly continue to print a wider variety of subjects, and communicate through images & the written word, but our horizons are expanding as we speak.

The center of this is not even digital print, but rather (call it what you may) the electronic/digital/digitized file. When the content of the file is in digital form, it enables a wide variety of output. Yes, it can be printed traditionally, most commonly offset, but it might also be printed on a digital press, sent to an iPad, or downloaded on the Web.

So we see, everything surrounds the file, not the printed word. Heresy you say!? Since I've gone through the same thought progression, I understand. But I have come to the conclusion that it's just the way it is; I don't have a choice.

Therefore, even if we intend to traditionally print within our customer base and niche, it's in our best interest (putting it mildly) to completely understand the file. In fact, we must now focus on the file first, because our customers may require multiple delivery methods, manipulation, integration, and even storage. Those that are most ready & able to deliver these in a versatile, secure way, will win.

What I've just explained, perhaps even too simply, is called Content Aggregation. As we learn, this is the place to start.

More on this to follow.