The end of a financial year often brings with it a new internal whirlpool in organisations.
Most companies in India have an unwritten rule of how depending on how the year has gone by, the companies should measure and value their employees and reward them or not. This generally brings a certain amount of tension in the air in most offices, a sense of excitement and often also disappointment.
Appraisal is not a novelty event though, the practice of performance appraisal dates back to the third century when the emperors of the Wei Dynasty (221–265AD) rated the performance of the official family members.
Even at that time, the fairness was questioned. A rater employed by the Wei Dynasty said: “The Imperial Rater seldom rates men according to their merits, but always according to his likes and dislikes”
Having been on both sides of the table, there is no wrong side or position to this.
Its normal for humans to expect being treated for their worth & getting what they deserve or be valued.
Being an “ amateur creative “ person this last few years, often found myself at the receiving end of not being acknowledged or even appreciated and me despite reading JRR Tolkien who said “ “Deeds will not be less valiant because they are unpraised.”, I have often found my spirit broken on continuing these kind of projects.
However this time my learning is different, in fact its two fold, the first one that I got rightly accused of not “valuing “ the team enough and it’s not necessarily in terms of monetary engagement, but just demonstrating my appreciation and that was bolt from the blue as I regard myself rather high on the matrix of “ team first “ approach.
This accusation and complaint took a day or two to sink in & I think that this lesson was timely and was for the better. Over a period of time, you tend to take for granted the people who are already putting in the efforts that you tend to expect from them. While in your mind, you are not disparaging the efforts, the need for an pat on the shoulder is a time immemorial need and integral part of keeping the flock together and happy.
The second one was more a more pertinent lesson in human psychology and behavioural science.
I got significant backlash for experimenting with employees with different job approaches and them of being salaries higher then what benchmark we would normally start with & that simply amazed me as that why would anyone feel that they are valued less, because someone else got something more then what “ they thought “ the new employees deserved. Why would it be important for someone to be valued lessor for me to get valued more ?
This was also amply well exampled in the movie 3 Idiots when the results came and 2 of the idiots were more sad because their friend came first vs being happy that they passed “Dost fail ho jaye toh dukh hota hai … Lekin dost first aa jaye toh zyada dukh hota hai ”
This lesson will stay longer as I definitely have a different opinion on that, one that is espoused by Robin Sharma “ “Run your own race. Who cares what others are doing? The only question that matters is ‘Am I progressing?’”
But I guess that will never change.
So May has been a fun month so far, one that has questioned our beliefs and also implored us to be better. I have learnt a lot and promise to be better, keeping the flock together is a continuous process, to wait for April to be better, is at best counterproductive.
The goal always has been and should be to build trust & the goal for the team should be to trust the process.
“The good news is that the moment you decide that what you know is more important than what you have been taught to believe, you will have shifted gears in your quest for abundance. Success comes from within, not from without.” — Emerson
