Fred says,
> All that said, I do not believe the debate is about the niceties or the
>basis of measurement but, rather, the psychological and organizational
>consequences of ranking employees. On that score, I believe the
>discussants on this list fall into two categories: proponents, and
>opponents.
That was my impression, also, although Robert may be a proponent of rating
and an opponent of ranking.
Then he says,
> The central issue, then, is the means used to do the ranking. If they
>are ranked based on objective measures of performance, the ranking,
>although constituting an ordinal array, has a basis in some other scale
>of measurement. If they are ranked simply in terms of managerial
>preferences or perceptions, that is an entirely different basis of
>measurement.
I think this is dangerous on several scores. First, one person's
objectivity is a lot different than another's. Ray Evans Harrell, while
we have a lot in common in some areas, have very different views of what
qualifies as "objective".
Second, sticking to the objective leaves out a lot of rich territory for
exploration. How do we get at attitudes, energy, enthusiasm? Even more
important, how do we identify -- and recognize -- someone who is
inherently (as opposed to positionally) powerful? How do we recognize
'presence'? How do we even recognize someone who is willing to take
reasonable risks, and willing to be innovative? How do we assess values?
These are difficult to measure in an objective way, but no less important.
Fred, there is something in what you say, in that being clear and
well-defined is important wherever possible. Does that fit with what you
mean by 'objective' or do you mean more than that?
--Rol Fessenden
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <rkarash@karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>