This is an overview of performance evaluation process in IT company. History, current and plans for the future. Created for HR Cafe (http://dou.ua/calendar/1280/) in Feb 2012.

1. Building performance review
process in IT company
CQG Ukraine
Dmitry Guyvoronsky

2. Background
Who? What? Why?

3. About us
Proprietary solutions for financial trading industry
Client/server software
High quality and performance requirements
Own product, almost no external customers
Long-term employment (5+ years on average)

4. History
Product development expansion
1980: CQG founded in Denver (2 employees)
1998: Moscow office (50+)
2004: Kiev, Samara, Yerevan (120+)
2006: Zelenograd (250+)

5. Employees over time
(very approximately)

6. Present day
6 development offices, 15 offices worldwide,
300+ developers, 500+ employees total
Average employee spent 5+ years in company, some
spent 15+ yrs
100+ projects / year
We love numbers - and collect a lot of metrics
LOCs, defects, code review rate, D/density, time
distribution

7. Performance evaluation
History

8. 1980-1990 The beginning
10-50 employees, “family business”
Single office, everyone knows everyone
Ad-hoc performance management
No formal process
No defined expectations

9. 1990-2003 Sizing up
60-120 employees
2 PD offices, distributed development
Annual performance review w/ manager
Basic process (paper-form feedbacks, Word
documents, emails, set of questions)
No software tools

10. 2004-2007 Rapid growth
120-350 employees
6 offices
Semi-annual performance review w/ different managers
Formally defined process (v1.0)
For everybody (not only PD)
External software - 360degree, SuccessFactors,
iVantage

11. Process v1.0
Roles defined
Developer, Team Lead, Process Coach, Project
Manager, System Owner, Resource Director, etc.
Formal job description for each role
Success criteria for each role

12. Process v1.0
Core competencies defined for each role:
Developer: drive for results, quantity, quality,
functional skills, timeliness
Team Lead: building effective teams, motivating
others, organizing
Process Coach: customer focus, presentation skills
Project Manager: dealing with ambiguity, negotiating,
informing, ...

13. Define: Competence(y)
Ability of an individual to perform a job properly. A
competency is a set of defined behaviors that provide a
structured guide enabling the identification, evaluation and
development of the behaviors in individual employees.
As defined, the term "competence" first appeared 1970
article titled "Planning the Executive Development Program"
Has since been popularized by McBer & Company
(currently the "Hay Group") colleague Richard Boyatzis and
many others

14. Competency example
BUILDS EFFECTIVE TEAMS: Blends people into teams when
needed; creates strong morale and spirit in his/her team; shares
wins and successes; fosters open dialogue; lets people finish and
be responsible for their work; defines success in terms of the
whole team; creates a feeling of belonging in the team.
Unskilled:
Doesn’t assemble, build or manage in a team fashion
Doesn’t create a common mindset or common challenge;
rewards and compliments individuals, not the team
Doesn’t manage in a way that builds team morale or energy
...

15. Process v1.0
Team Process Project
Self Dev
Lead Coach Manager
Dev +
Team
+ + +
Lead
Process
+ + +
Coach
Project
+ + +
Manager

16. Process v1.0
Semi-annual cycle, May/Dec
External tools to collect and process feedback
2 weeks to collect/process feedback
1 month for performance talks

17. Process v1.0
Pros
Defined process known to everybody
Success criteria for each role
Documented performance history
Cons
“Shtirlitz syndrome” (only last project matters)
No correlation with project metrics
No direct comparison
External tools suck at large

18. 2008-2012 Stable success
350-500+ employees
6 offices, more sales/support offices worldwide
Semi-annual performance review w/ different managers
Formally defined process (v2.0)
External tools partially replaced with internal tools
Grades for developers (QA, SysAdmins, ...)
Product/department goals formally defined

19. Process v2.0
Additional roles defined (Business Analyst, ...)
Same competencies-based approach

20. Process v2.0
New: Project-based performance feedback
2 weeks after project went to production
Collected for whole project team
Discussed and corrected at project postmortem
(metrics could be included)

21. Process v2.0
Semi-annual feedback form refined
Competencies now include numeric ratings along
with free-form text
Switched from external tool to Excel forms for pilot
project

22. Process v2.0
Grades introduced
Junior/Regular/Senior/Lead
Developer/AT engineer/Sysadm/SCM engineer
Grade depends on
Technical skills
Leadership
Process maturity
English level
Grades help define roadmap for personal development

23. Process v2.0
Pros
Defined process known to everybody
Success criteria for each role
Documented performance history
Short-term (project-based) + long-term (6 months) feedback = more
complete feedbacks
Ratings = analytics & reporting becomes possible (aggregated)
Grades define requirements for personal/professional growth
Cons
Still lacking correlation with project metrics (remember, we love numbers!)
Excel automation sucks too

24. What’s next?
Sky is the limit

25. 2012 and beyond
Replace ext. tools with in-house solution
Web-based
Integrated with project database
Previous history imported
Easy to use on daily basis
Use KPI/metrics for annual performance evaluation
where appropriate - Team Leads, Project Managers,
Business Drivers, ...

26. Questions?
http://about.me/dreamiurg
@dreamiurg