Forced Distribution

Is the forced distribution (forced ranking) method a fair way of doing performance evaluations? Why or why not? Try to look at from both the perspective of an employee and the perspective of the organization.

Forced distribution method is a tool used for performance assessment of employees in performance management system. This method does ratings of poor, good, and excellent based on employee’s performance. I do not believe this method is fair because it does not truly depict employee’s work performance or skills, and it lacks transparency. There are a variety of behavioral traits that can make it difficult to compare employees, especially if there are numerous employees within the company. This can create unnecessary competition among employees, which can lead to a hostile work environment and resentment. Employees perspective: Employees might think that this evaluation system may not always be effective to indicate the true performance of the employees and could discourage them due to the pressure. Organizations perspective: Although the system might help leaders identify employees effectiveness based on performance, they might believe the system used as a motivator, might demotivate the employees in a later period, which may lead to employee turnover.