Six reasons why continuous performance review is necessary

Continuous performance review helps your employees stay engaged and productive. It’s important to make your employees aware of their contributions toward the organization’s growth and align their performance with overall business goals. Annual performance reviews have become a thing of the past, and they no longer help employees to perform better. Your employees may complete an immense amount of work within a year. Reviewing the performance of each employee once a year may cause your managers to miss out some key achievements or areas for improvement, which may demoralize your employees and negatively affect their future performance. This blog decodes what continuous performance reviews are and why it is important to shift to continuous performance reviews.

What are continuous performance reviews?

Continuous performance reviews are a part of the performance appraisal process that encourages organizations to set short-term goals for employees and evaluate how they progress towards those goals once every month or three months. Exchanging continuous feedback frequently creates a positive work environment that enables employees to overcome roadblocks in their performance and pave the way for development.

Why should organizations adopt continuous performance reviews?

While increased employee engagement, a trusting work environment, and better alignment with organizational goals are some of the many benefits of continuous performance reviews, there are other reasons why every organization should adopt them.

• Helps employees to understand their contribution

As your employees receive meaningful feedback throughout the year, they will know where they stand in your organization and what is expected from them in terms of performance. They will know when they are succeeding in real time as recognition and appreciation become more frequent. This will help them feel valued, spurring them to work even better. They will also be able to determine their strengths and weaknesses and track how they are improving. Your managers will be well informed about each employee’s performance and potential. This helps them to identify and address pain points or issues at an early stage.

• Maintains organizational goals

With continuous performance reviews, you can easily track if your employees are working toward your organizational goals. Setting achievable goals and reviewing them on a regular basis will help employees stay focused. Sometimes, due to changing market conditions, yearly goals become irrelevant. Reviewing them often will help you align business targets with the present market situation. This enables your employees to focus on what is essential, and it’s also a chance for you to gain feedback from your employees, who might know your market better.

• Provides continuous development opportunities

Continuous performance reviews play a crucial role in employee training and development. It’s a great way to understand the strengths and weaknesses of your employees and identify skill gaps. This will help you to organize meaningful training and development programs that match employee needs. As employees build up their skills, they will be able to adapt better to the dynamic demands of your customers. This goes a long way toward improving morale as employees are given the opportunity to enhance their skills rather than only being penalized for not performing better. Productivity improves as employees are empowered to excel.

• Reduces implicit bias

One of the major concerns with yearly performance reviews is that managers tend to focus on an employee’s recent achievements rather than their achievements throughout the year. This can be unfair as some employees may not have been able to perform at their best during the last few months due to legitimate reasons. Inaccurate performance reviews can demoralize your hard-working employees, holding them back from performing better. On the other hand, continuous performance reviews can completely avoid this problem through regular manager-to-employee discussions.

Also read: 6 unconscious biases that impact performance reviews

• Improves employee engagement and motivation

According to HubSpot, 98% of employees are disengaged due to the lack of continuous feedback from their managers. Employees need constructive feedback about their performance to remain engaged with their jobs. Continuous performance review is one of the signs that your organization invests in employee well-being and cares about making the review process a positive experience. This goes a long way in keeping employees engaged, happy, and motivated. Continuous reviews also allow employees to provide their own feedback, which plays a huge role in improving employee engagement and satisfaction.

• Improves your organization’s bottom line

Employee performance greatly influences your company’s bottom line. Having a continuous review system that helps employees navigate their job responsibilities and expectations allows them to improve their overall performance. This builds a happy, engaged, and productive workforce and decreases employee turnover. All these factors together improve your organization’s bottom line.

A number of organizations are switching to a continuous performance review system to improve their employee experience. A well-designed system takes the pressure off your employees’ shoulders, allowing them to achieve their best while staying on the same page with their managers. This develops a positive work culture in your organization and helps your business to grow by improving employee retention and attracting top talent to your job openings.

Introducing Continuous Review in Zoho People

We are excited to introduce our Continuous Review feature, which will be a part of the Performance Management module. Continuous Review works closely with Goals in Zoho People to build an engaged and productive workforce. This feature:

• Allows you to conduct reviews monthly, quarterly, or half-yearly, according to your preference

• Conducts the review in two stages—self-review and manager review

• Enables you to configure the review start and end dates to ensure that the review remains timely and relevant

• Saves the continuous performance ratings of each employee so that it can be referred to during the annual appraisal cycle

Continuous Review streamlines the entire performance management process and brings the best out of your employees. We hope you get the most out of this feature! Explore our Continuous Review help guide to learn more. If you have any questions regarding Continuous Review, feel free to write to us at support@zohopeople.com.