Continuous Performance Management: the shift from accountability to development

Imagine the day when someone in a horse and buggy saw an automobile for the first time. That person must have thought, “There's a better way; I'm looking at the future.” That's the way we create things from technology to new ideas: first, we crawl, then learn to walk and finally run. In the workforce, our version of crawling was to regard employees as assets to be held accountable by stick or carrot via annual performance reviews. The iterations of how to motivate, engage, and retain employees grown and changed over the decades. Now, finally, we are taking our first steps at a run with a philosophy and practice called Continuous Performance Management.

Year-end performance reviews are increasingly no longer a best practice because they don't reflect the needs of modern workers. In one study, 95% of employees are dissatisfied with the annual review process and 90% don't believe they provide accurate information.