So far we have focused on how individuals who have dedicated themselves to being the best have voluntarily sought out critical feedback to improve themselves. This begs the question about what happens when people are involuntarily made to provide or receive feedback. Does this feedback actually lead to improvement? The most common example today is the tradition of the employee performance evaluations often used by companies.

The short article, “The Case against Performance Reviews” by Derek Thompson at The Atlantic is interesting because it focuses on the big question about whether the “evaluation process” itself is a flawed system.

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/01/the-case-against-performance-reviews/283402/

Theoretically, the performance review is supposed to convey information from the evaluator on how the receiving employee can improve. However, there are many potential pitfalls that could diminish the effectiveness of performance reviews.

• The evaluator is unable to provide objective feedback because of intrinsic biases. Thompson provides an example that most evaluators tend to favor other people who are similar to themselves and bias evaluations of employees who are different.
•  Most criticism is received negatively by employees. Thompson cites research that the tendency of the average person to dislike receiving feedback/criticism perhaps can influence how that person acts upon the feedback information received