Employee performance management has a less-than-stellar track record, despite being a pervasive practice in enterprises around the world. One of the biggest problems—as anyone who's been an employer or manager knows—is that too often performance reviews are a twice-yearly or even annual affair, and related discussions and goals can fall by the wayside.
To this end, SAP has added features for "continuous" performance management to its SuccessFactors software. Here's the scoop from SAP's announcement:
Designed to solve some of the frequently cited issues of performance management programs, the new capabilities facilitate ongoing one-on-one check-ins between employees and managers to help ensure activities, accomplishments and goals stay on track throughout the year.
By focusing on the evaluation of past performance rather than impacting future performance, traditional performance management initiatives are often too reactive and rigid to enable a high-performing workforce.
By using continuous performance management within SAP SuccessFactors Performance & Goals:
Employees can take more ownership for their performance — document progress, capture achievements and stay aligned to business goals — to get the feedback and coaching required to perform and improve.
Managers can get a complete view into what their teams are working on and provide regular and effective guidance to employees.
HR can track the frequency of one-on-one conversations taking place within an organization, remind employees and managers to have performance conversations, and provide guidance on effective coaching.
The capabilities are part of the SuccessFactors Q1 release.
Analysis: A Welcome Move for SuccessFactors
"We know performance management is generally broken, for reasons that are outside of the reach of software vendors," says Constellation Research VP and principal analyst Holger Mueller. "But when performance management does not work all of talent management does not work, and that is not something enterprises can afford to let happen."
Therefore, "it's good to see the 800-pound gorilla of performance management, SuccessFactors, go back to the drawing board," Mueller adds. "The direction taken with more continuous feedback is certainly a more successful course."
SAP won't be able to claim the new features are exclusive or even entirely novel, as other vendors in the space, such as Cornerstone on Demand and PeopleFluent, have emphasized the concept of continuous employee-manager feedback in their products. Still, SuccessFactors Employee Central customers now have another reason to consider adding talent to the core suite.
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