Perhaps some surrogates exist? One needs to ask the question: what do I
*really* want to accomplish?
In our organization (a physical plant organization at a large, land-grant,
research institution), we have struggled no end with simply having the
trades accept *customer* feedback as having meaning. This is a long way
from peer review but to my way of thinking more to the point.
Most respondents seem to assume some linkage between review and pay.
Perhaps this is not so? (Is pay governed by a collective bargaining
agreement or by a civil-service, lifetime employment approach?) If so,
then reviews can be made quite helpful, it'd seem to me, because they
aren't linked in any way to a fixed pool of $s available for raises.
One notion that might work (although we haven't tried it formally), is a
360-degree evaluation program based on an evaluation instrument driven by
the unit's mission/vision (or some other value system, like Stephen
Covey's). Covey Leadership has some an instrument. I've used it
personally, and found it quite helpful.
Key, though, would seem to be a detailed evaluation of the organization's
culture. Are you leaping too far ahead?
>I would like feedback from any companys that have implemented peer-rating
>systems for front-line employees, particularly those in craft areas. What
>are the results? What can a company expect when it starts? How long
>before the employees start feeling comfortable with giving and receiving
>performance-improvement comments?
Cheers,
Peter
"I may be at home, but I'm compulsive."
--peterlin@uclink4.berkeley.edu (Peter Lin)
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>