Just curious. Has everyone heard this every year since they started? Why do they even say it? Where are the not em very competitive rank groups?
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People talk about HiPos and sponsored HiPos, but there is also favoritism. The “golden children” get a free pass. managers slide them into G and VG ratings just to throw someone else under the bus.
I have seen a former President’s Planner get high ranking in next position that he was not qualified for and did nothing and the watched Retirement Eligible person do the same job even better and get NSI.
Ranking follows sponsorship and ultimate potential. Performance can only move you up 2 to 3 places for folks in the middle.
From my experience role and assigned projects have more to do with your ranking than your personal contribution does. Get the right high visibility role and the ranking will follow.
@ed No issue with constant improvement. Issue is that ranking is bizarre. Its all perception based not performance based. Even senior leaders who walk around telling everyone what outstanding or excellent looks like rarely live themselves with the same principles. They assess people purely based on who they know and like vs what the individual has done. Everyone knows this but still they dont care or will do something about this. Its very disappointing.
The forced ranking is the problem, as if everything is easily comparable across different roles. If you have met every single target your supervisor/manager set for the year and ranked 2nd from last, how do you keep your motivation up?
Every year the population is culled and distilled to a higher octane alcohol. It gets more competitive every year. What was good last year is NI this year.
At one point, IT had close to 10K employees, with plenty of fat to trim. This year there are about 4K employees with not much fat to trim. Before someone from the business says all of IT su-ks (all fat to be trimmed) just think how all groups and divisions have much smaller headcount’s, all while HR policies force a minimum of 5% be placed in NSI, regardless of individual’s absolute performance. This policy is enforced every year. After a number of years under this policy, practically every group is competitive, which is another way of saying, even though there are great employees, some of them must be placed in NSI. Hence the hunger game references people talk about every year. There must be tribute paid to the HR beasts who bow and worship DW.
@OP, yes of course. It’s code for politics beyond your control that have nothing to do with your performance have determined that the company is not going to do right by you, so you can stay and manage the inevitable ranking decline, or go look for meritocracy elsewhere. So embrace the su-k or get out. And by the way, why would I owe someone as insignificant as you any explanation anyways?