Management Stripped Bare

The A to Z of Management

Most managers face the same types of situations, over and over. No one “cure-all” theory of management applies. Rather, management is about learning to do a thousand different things, in the right way and at the right time. Some harsh truths from management, from A-Z, are as follows:

Annual Evaluations

At evaluation time, euphemisms pop up like dandelions. Reviewers resort to code words to be politically correct. This assures that anyone who reads an evaluation later will require a code-breaker to decipher its meaning. Common distortions include:

• “Outstanding performance” – The employee being reviewed rescued the reviewer’s bacon.
• “Below average performance” – “Who hired this moron?”  
• “Above average performance” – Average performance.
• “Average performance” – Not so good. In the mathematically impossible world of performance reviews, where 95% of employees are average or above, average performance automatically translates to “barely acceptable performance.”
• “Challenging year” – It was catastrophic.
• “Needs to develop interpersonal...