In Americas best-run and most-admired organizations, employee performance appraisal is a vital and vigorous management tool. No other management process has as much influence on individuals careers and work lives.

Used well, employee performance appraisal is the most powerful instrument that organizations have to mobilize the energy of every employee in the enterprise toward the achievement of strategic goals. Employee performance appraisal can focus each persons attention on the companys mission, vision and values. And ideally, the process can answer the two fundamental questions that every single person in the organization wants the answers to: What do you expect of me? And How am I doing?

But most folks scoff at the idea that there might be a perfect system for doing employee performance appraisal. They think that since their organization is unique, then their system for analyzing employee performance must be unique, too. How foolish.