The retiring shuttles are going to be sent to museums at the Kennedy Space Flight Center in Florida, where the shuttles were launched; to Los Angeles, where the shuttles were built; to the Smithsonian institute in Washington D.C., the premier space museum in the country; and to New York, a place that had absolutely nothing to do with the Apollo operations.  Houston, the control center for the operations,was left out.  Now, how could that happen?  Do you think that lobbying and politics had anything to do with the decision.  Naw, not a chance!

Now to the air traffic controllers who are unreasonably being asked to stay awake during their shifts, especially considering that they are only making $167,000 a year.  The business community decision would have been to fire the offenders and hire people who could manage to stay aware for  that kind of money.  What are the feds going to do?  They are going to hire 27 more controllers at a total cost of $4,509,000 a year to make sure that there is back-up at small one controller type airports, in case the other guy or gal falls asleep.  The usual federal fix, “throw money at the problem” – more spending will fix everything. Could this perhaps be a small example of the bigger problem in Washington?

Finally, a new stamp has come out with the face of the Statute of Liberty.  The only problem is that the image was taken at a casino in Las Vegas rather than in the New York bay, and they are different.  Truth is really more interesting than fiction.  You can’t make this stuff up!  I wonder if accountability has anything to do with the last two problems described?

This may involve laying federal workers off.  Oh! Oh!  No wonder I’ve never heard a politician, during our financial crisis, suggest anything that would make federal workers share the pain that private workers are feeling, from layoffs.  Federal employment has been increasing.  Federal spending is now 25 % of the GDP.  It was 19 % a couple of years ago.

Now let’s get more aggressive.  The 5% is just a start.  That just takes care of the goofing off.  If every federal employee read Chapter 6 of my book, not only would that make me a fabulously rich man, but they would learn that almost every process (the work they do), can be done more efficiently if some thought is put into it.  (But we’ve always done it this way, is usually the reply).  Processes can be incrementally improved or reengineered, using fewer people to perform them  (Oh! Oh!, again).  Of course, federal employees do not have the financial incentive to become more efficient, but that is a whole other subject.  Maybe that move will get the total federal government savings up 15%?

Got to close.  Obama also said that his administration was going to merge, consolidate and re-organize government agencies.  Not gonna happen!!!  There are not enough politicians in Washington who ever take off their “small hat” (what will benefit them) and put on their “ big hat” (what benefits the country as a whole), to give that idea a snow balls chance in hell.  What’s wrong with 12 different agencies dealing with exports?  – It’s job security.  If this big picture approach could be  taken, government spending could be cut by 30%, maybe more?  Now we’re talking – a 30% reduction versus a 5 year freeze on spending.  Let’s get serious, Mr. President.

Sorry for the length of this blog.  It’s an exception.  Once I get started on the government, I can’t stop!  Besides that, I haven’t blogged for over a month, so you have it coming.

Secondly, and on a little more serious note, Dr. W. Edwards Deming, generally regarded as the leading authority in the world on Total Quality Management (TQM), said the following about employee performance evaluations.  He called the use of evaluations one of the deadly sins of organizations.  He contended that evaluations “leave people bitter, bruised, battered, desolate, despondent, dejected, feeling inferior, and some even depressed” (Deming 1982).  OTHER THAN THAT HE LIKED THEM!

While I have great respect for the late Dr. Deming and almost everything that he taught,  I disagree with his position on this subject.  The key question to me is, if you don’t do performance evaluations, how do you decide “rewards?”  Rewards should be based on performance, as I stated in an earlier blog.  Conclusions about performance come about during performance evaluations.  Now if rewards are based on “seniority,” or some equally ridiculous criterion, then maybe Dr. Deming is on to something.

I’m taking the rest of the year off from my blogs (thank goodness, right?), so I’ll see ya in 2011.  Have a blessed Christmas and a happy New Year.  John

Let me provide a couple of quick hints about how to ease the pain.  First, each party should write-up their thoughts and give the document to the other party a week before the evaluation.  No flying by the seat of the pants here.  This task is too important for that.  This approach gives the participants the opportunity to reflect on what the other party says, outside of the field of combat.  This will also help to prevent knee-jerk reactions.  The boss may even conclude, “Yea, maybe my worker has a point good here?”

The purpose of the discussion is for the two people to go through the documents, compare thoughts, and attempt to come up with mutually acceptable conclusions, even when weaknesses are involved in the discussion.  Some re-wording to satisfy both participants may be in order.  But in the end, it is the higher level person’s evaluation, and if a mutual conclusion cannot be reached about a specific point, then the manager should decide how the final document will read.

But here is my most important hint.  Let the person being evaluated be the first one to speak on each of the three components that I mentioned last week.  It’s hardly even done.  Have you seen it done or experienced it?  This approach will guarantee a mutual discussion versus a lecture from the boss.  It will also be very symbolic.

I think that an evaluation should have three components.  The first is a discussion of  how well the employee did relative to the goals established in the last formal evaluation.  Formal evaluations are usually done yearly.  This discussion should start with what went well, so as to get off to a positive start.  Then things that did not go as well as they could have should be discussed, as an integral part of the growth and development process.

The second component is a discussion of what the goals should be for the coming period, considering what the vision and goals of the organizations are.  The idea is to get alignment between the vision, organizational goals, and the cumulative goals of all the employees.  The better the alignment, the more successful the organization will be, because people are focusing  their efforts on the right things.

The third component is a discussion of the growth and development of the person being evaluated.  This is the key component and has some sub-components.  First, the opportunities for improvement in performance should be discussed.  These are the things that did not go so well in the past year.  It is very important that this discussions be couched in terms of the evaluator being interested in the growth of the person being evaluated.  We can all improve our performance in the workplace, in spite of the fact that some of us may think that “we have arrived.”  It is a way to turn weaknesses into strengths, in the next evaluation.

Then there needs to be a discussion of the employee’s aspirations for the future, and what educational opportunities and work assignments should be considered in light of the given aspirations.  If this third component is handled well,  it can have  a very positive motivating impact on the discussion as a whole. 

Performance evaluations can be awkward for both parties.  Next week I will suggest a process that takes away some of the awkwardness and which can result in a very positive experience for both parties.

First, many managers don’t feel they have the time to do regular performance evaluations.  I say, “baloney” (you can be more graphic if you would like).  Books have been written on “time management,” but I can condense it down to eleven words.  We all find the time do what we think is important.  It’s that simple.  If a manager doesn’t do regular performance evaluations, it’s because he/she doesn’t think they are important enough to invest their time on.  What they fail to recognize is that the main purpose of an evaluation is to “grow and develop” the employee being evaluated, which in turn, will make the employee and the manager more successful in the future – a win-win situation.

Another major reason for not doing evaluations or doing them poorly, is something that afflicts many people in the workplace, and elsewhere, namely, ”the fear of confrontation.”  Good evaluations must deal with negatives, and because of this fear, many times they are not dealt with.  A common scenario is when a manager attempts to terminate an employee for cause, they can’t do it because the files do not reflect the negatives.

This is a three-part blog.  Next week I will deal with the components of a good evaluation – what should be covered and why, with emphasis on growth and development.  In the last blog I will recommend a process for doing the evaluations.

Mr. Alan Mulally became the President and CEO of the Ford Motor Company in 2006.  Prior to that he was the President and CEO of the Boeing Commercial Airplane Division.  Senior Managers at Ford, during their periodic meetings on the status of their far-flung international operations, used a color code to deal with problems.  Green reflected that everything was O.K., and red reflected a problem.  Just like taking a drive.

Prior to Mulally’s arrival, there was no “red” to be found anywhere.  You don’t reveal problems, you fix them before anybody finds out.  That was the culture of the organization.  At one of Mulally’s first such meetings, an executive took a risk and flashed some “red” on the screen.  Maybe he was checking out the new boss on the block.

Just as soon as the problem was revealed, a single person in the audience started clapping.   Everybody looked around to see who is was, and it was Mr. Mulally.  He then said to the confessing executive, “Thank you for your honesty.”  That one act by Mulally changed the culture of Ford.  Executives now know that they can be totally honest with the boss.  So from that day forward the collective wisdom of all the executives involved, based on their many years of diverse experiences, could be applied to the problem at hand, rather than having the confessor trying to solve it on his own before anybody finds out.

This story also involves the concepts of “trust” and “teamwork.”  Chapter 13 of my book, entitled “Integrity, Trust and Concern,” sheds more light on the subjects of honesty and trust. It won’t be unlucky for you to read it, honestly.

But you know, there are some other criteria for giving raises to employees that aren’t much better; well, maybe a little better.  How about giving raises to your “favorites.”  Or, rewarding employees if the are “squeaky wheels.”  Gotta give em a little oil.

I want to make a strong pitch for only one criterion for giving raises, and that is “performance.”  The better the performance the higher the raise.  Did you know that for approximately the last two decades, raises for workers have basically tracked with the yearly rate of inflation?  Would someone please tell me what inflation has to do with performance?  Nothing!

But here is the criterion that really gets under my skin - paying employees based on “seniority.”  Woody Allen said, “80 percent of the job is showing up.”  This is so true  in many organizations.  It’s a big item with Teacher’s Unions.  Could there be a correlation between the popularity of this criterion and the state of our educational system?  Something to think about!

Where is the motivation to excel in performance if it’s not going to make any difference?  Those who have been there the longest will get the highest pay.  Doesn’t make sense to me.  I welcome contrary views.

Please vote this Tuesday whether it results in a raise or not.

While  this approach may be fine for us, would it be effective in a business setting?  No, but some business meetings don’t differ too much from what I outlined.  I’ve been to my share of them.  First, if you are going to “accomplish something” (key words), you need a leader who comes with an agenda.  This is quite commonly done for business meetings but the following isn’t.  The leader should have in the back of her mind what she wants to accomplish.  What is the purpose of the meeting?  Is it to disseminate information or is it to finalize a decision on a specific matter?  This is not to say that the leader comes with the solution, but that she knows that a decision needs to be made by the group on the issue at hand, today.

Why did I throw in that the meeting would be for two hours?  Because of the following truism.  A meeting will almost always take the time that is allotted for it.  If too much time is allotted to cover the agenda items, the participants will somehow use the time up rather than adjourning early.  People just love to hear themselves talk.  The leader can control this but many times she doesn’t.

If you care to share your experience with business meetings, please feel free to comment.  Also, men, did you notice that I made the leader a female?  That’s because I’m going to write a blog soon on who makes better leaders, woman or men?  Stay tuned.

“Suddenly, I saw myself standing on a platform of a well lit, warm, and pleasant lecture room.  In front of me sat an attentive audience on comfortable unholstered seats.  I was giving a lecture on the psychology of concentration camps” (Frankl, Viktor E. “Man’s Search For Meaning,” 1984).

Dr. Frankl had a future to look forward to and he survived to experience it.  What are you looking forward to in the future?  Do you have a dream that sustains you through life or are you just existing from day to day?  Do you have plans for the future that makes you feel good about yourself?  Do you have something significant yet to do in the future?

I published my first book, “Leading From the Heart” earlier this year at the young age of 74.  I worked on it, off and on, over a 15 year period.  That dream was always in front of me.  It had great sustaining value.  So give this subject some thought.  What do you want  to accomplish for the rest of your life?  Make up a meaningful “bucket list.”  It’s never too late to get started.