Innføring av karaktersystemer på arbeidsplassen?

Det danske magasinet Arbejdsmiljø meldte for en tid tilbake at danske bedrifter har tatt i mer sofistikerte systemer for vurdering av de ansatte. Etter hvert som amerikanisert personalledelse i form av individuell lønnsfastsettelse, individuell prestasjonsvurdering og individuelle kompetanseplaner har blitt mer vanlig i Skandinavia, har også karaktergivning blitt mer vanlig på arbeidsplassen.

Dette har naturlig nok skapt debatt ettersom det bryter med den såkalte ”solidaritetsmodellen” som har vært dominerende i norske virksomheter.

Resultatene fra ulike forskninger synes å være sprikende; svenske Elizabeth Neu sier at bedrifter som gir medarbeidere karakterer mener det gir tydelighet og systematikk i lønnssetting, og at det er en rettferdig metode.

Andre argumenterer at slike systemer kan få negative konsekvenser for samarbeidsklimaet – spesielt når medarbeiderne begynner å sammenligne karakterer som kan gi unødvendige konflikter både mellom kollegaer, samt mellom leder og medarbeider.

Man skiller gjerne mellom to typer evaluering: summativ og formativ. Summative vurderinger (som vi er vant med fra skolesystemet) og formative vurderinger hvor man får tilbakemeldinger på hvordan jobben kan gjøres bedre.

I Dagens Næringsliv 26. oktober stiller Bård Kuvaas ved Handelshøyskolen BI hva jeg anser som å være sentralt i diskusjonen; hvor motivert blir du egentlig av å høre at dine prestasjoner er gjennomsnittlige eller til og med under gjennomsnittet?

Faktum er at en typisk organisasjon består av flest gjennomsnittlige medarbeidere. Organisasjoner som klarer å utnytte hver enkelt medarbeider på best mulig måte, står igjen om vinnere i sine bransjer.

Andre spørsmål knyttet til innføring av slike verktøy:

- Hvor fleksibel er ordningene dine? Karaktersystemer fordrer en svært tett oppfølging. Er dette mulig i en ”moderne” kompetansebedrift?

- Hvor komplekse er arbeidsoppgavene? Er det mulig å måle alle faktorer som påvirker dine medarbeidere sine prestasjoner? Gir karakterfastsettingen et helhetlig bilde av hvordan den enkelte har utført jobben sin

- Hvilken signaleffekt gir en innføring av et slikt system? Det er velkjent at slike systemer er vanlige i nedbemanningsprosesser – er dette et signal du ønsker å kommunisere?

BRIC vinner talentkrigen

Til tross for et nytt oppsving i verdensøkonomien, har det ikke blitt skapt nye jobber i de rike landene hvor arbeidsløsheten mange steder er rekordhøy. Arbeidsløsheten for de vestlige europeiske landene forventes å være på 9,3 prosent i 2011 og er, i følge Det internasjonale pengefond (IMF), én av de største utfordringene vi står ovenfor.

IMF anslår en global økonomisk vekst på 4,3 prosent neste år. For Norge er 1,8 prosent. Samtidig står de såkalte BRIC landene frem. I følge IMF kan Brasil forvente en vekst i BNP på 6,3 prosent frem til 2015. Russland, India og Kina kan også forvente solid økonomisk vekst på henholdsvis 15,2, 9,8 og 11,9 prosent.

I tillegg ser hjemlige arbeidsgivere til å vinne kampen om talentene i disse markedene. Undersøkelser fra Universum viser en holdningsendring blant studentene som gjør at Amerikanske og Europeiske arbeidsgivere kan forvente seg en tøffere kamp om talentene fra hjemlige organisasjoner som kommuniserer og tilbyr målgruppene sine det de vil ha.

I Kina for eksempel, har har globale merkevarer som McKinsey, BCG, PwC og Morgan Stanley blitt byttet ut med nasjonale arbeidsgivere som Bank of China, China Mobile og CICC. I 2006 var bare to av de ti mest attraktive arbeidsgiverne i Kina nasjonale. I dag er syv av de ti mest attraktive arbeidsgiverne hjemlige. Denne trenden viser seg også i land som Brasil, Russland og India.

En analyse av 2000 kinesiske studenter viser at et konkurrerende arbeidsmiljø og manglende karriere- og utviklingsmuligheter gjør internasjonale arbeidsgivere mindre attraktive.

En oppfølgingsstudie av 10 000 respondenter viser at hjemlige arbeidsgivere er attraktive på grunn av sikkerhet, profesjonell trening og utvikling, samt komfortable arbeidsmiljø og muligheter for høy fremtidig inntjening.

HR avdelingene til Amerikanske og Europeiske selskaper som forsøker å penetrere vekstmarkedene ser ut til å gå en utfordrende tid i møte..

Kinas mest attraktive arbeidsgivere 2010:

1. Bank of China

2. China Mobile

3. Procter & Gamble

4. CICC

5. ICBC

6. HSBC

7. China Development Bank

8. Citi

9. China Merchants Bank

10. SGCC

Verdens mest attraktive arbeidsgivere

For andre år på rad presenterer Universum verdens mest attraktive arbeidsgivere. Google har sin øvre posisjon fra 2009, men møter i år sterk motstand fra de fire store revisjonsselskaper, KPMG, Ernst & Young, PricewaterhouseCoopers og Deloitte.


Universum’s rangeringsliste over verdens mest attraktive arbeidsgivere er basert på en spørreundersøkelse gjennomført blant 130 000 potensielle ingeniører og økonomer i verdens tolv største økonomier. Blant økonomene har de fire store revisjonsselskaper steget i rangeringen som er nå like bak Google som i år også rangerer høyest.


"Vi ser en klar global trend i at arbeidsgivere innen revisjon gjenvinner sin status blant økonomer etter et kort kjærlighetsforhold til IT bransjen, i tillegg er ”fast moving consumer goods” industrien i ferd med å styrke sin posisjonering”, sier Michal Kalinowski, administrerende direktør i Universum. "Derimot lokkes de blivende økonomene i år mindre av finans-, konsulent- og olje-og gass-sektoren."


Blant ingeniører er IT-selskapene fortsatt dominerende. Arbeidsgivere som Google, Microsoft og IBM beholder sine posisjoner og utfordres umiddelbart av Sony, som hopper opp på en fjerde plass. Nykommeren Apple trinnet direkte inn i topp ti som er sterkt dominert av amerikanske selskaper. Japanske Sony og tyske gigantene som BMW og Siemens er den eneste ikke-amerikanske selskaper blant de ti mest attraktive arbeidsgivere blant ingeniører.


Topp 10 - Økonomi
1. Google (1)
2. KPMG (8)
3. Ernst & Young (5)
4. PricewaterhouseCoopers (2)
5. Deloitte (10)
6. Procter & Gamble (6)
7. Microsoft (3)
8. The Coca-Cola Company (13)
9. J.P. Morgan (7)
10. Goldman Sachs (4)


Topp 10 – Teknologi
1. Google (1)
2. Microsoft (2)
3. IBM (3)
4. Sony (7)
5. BMW (4)
6. Intel (5)
7. General Electric (6)
8. Siemens (8)
9. Procter & Gamble (10)
10. Apple (ny)

2009 års rangering er plassert i parantes.

Se den fullstendige listen på www.universumglobal.com/Top50

Multinasjonale virksomheter er i økende grad klar over nåværende og framtidige utfordringer som oppstår i sammenheng med en nedadgående arbeidskraft. For å sikre og tiltrekke seg dyktige medarbeidere i fremtiden og opprettholde sin konkurranseevne, er det nødvendig å ha en godt utviklet Employer branding strategi. Virksomhetene som lykkes i å tiltrekke seg neste generasjon av topptalenter er presentert i rangeringslisten over mest attraktive arbeidsgivere

I Quit

According to an article in Wall Street Journal, this announcement from employees is likely to increase now that the market begins to loosen up.

The article points at the number of employees who voluntarily quit their jobs in February. For the first time since October 2008, this number surpassed the number being fired or discharged, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Recent research indicates that the number will continue to grow. In a survey conducted by Right Management at the end of 2009, 60 % of workers said they intended to leave their jobs when the market got better.

This might be surprising to many, but in fact it should not be. Let us look back a couple of years. These are the findings from Boston Globe in 2004:

•          “83 percent of employees are likely to seek new employment once the economy improves”

•          48 percent of managers are likely to seek new employment once the economy improves

•          75 percent of those managers are actively looking now

•          56 percent of HR professionals indicated it is likely that voluntary turnover would rise due to the improving economy.

Employee engagement tends to fall at times when there are fewer employees to contribute to the tough job of keeping the company alive. This statement is also supported in the article in Wall Street Journal where a survey for the Conference Board found that the drivers of the drop in job fulfillment included less satisfaction with wages and less interest in work.

In 2009, 34% of workers were satisfied with their wages, down more than seven percentage points from 1987. About 51 % in 2009 said they were interested in work, down 19 percentage points from 1987.

Let us combine this with the increasing shortage of talents.  In the United States, there are approximately 40 230 000 people over the age of 65. There are approximately 30 700 000 aged 18-24.

According to Financial Times (May 2009), 800 000 people aged 55+ have returned to the workforce due to the decreasing value of their savings and pensions. Many more are postponing their retirement for the same reasons. My prediction is that this group is temporary back, but will soon be out.

This could, and probably will, lead to:

•          Attrition boom

•          Retirement boom

•         Increased recruitment costs due to shortage of talent and severe competition

It is estimated to cost 30-50 % of the annual salary to replace entry-level employees, 150 % for middle level employees, and astonishing 400 % for specialized, high level employees.  Interesting times..

What is next for Toyota?

Maybe one of the most discussed business cases the last six months has been the situation at Toyota. I have therefore tried to analyze what exactly are the problems at once one of the most respected companies in the world, and it looks like there are more underlying problems at the organizations than simple floor maths and accelerators. 

First of all, it is interesting to see how Toyota has changed their strategic focus over the years; the company was near bankruptcy in the 1940s, but through an obsessive focus on quality in the manufacturing process (with the development of the famous “Toyota Way”), they managed to earn themselves a vital position in the automotive industry.

From the 1980s however, there seems to be a change in focus in their strategic direction; with market share as the indicator of success, they expanded their production systems into western countries – and this might be the root of the problem. And when the downturn in financial markets came around year 2000, they were forced to cost-cutting activities within manufacturing and human resources. Have Toyota finally paid a price in terms of quality for their increased quantity?

What is interesting is that Toyota tried to copy their success in Japan to other countries – completely ignoring cultural differences that are well documented. Already in the 1990s there were some signal of dissatisfaction from Toyota’s employees in the United States; a Tayloristic approach combined with arrogance from the top-management in terms of ignoring and accepting cultural and language barriers seem to split the organization.

It is interesting to see how a well-respected organization seem to completely have ignored basic management assumptions. Although sales are increasing at the moment, it will be interesting to see how they will prevent such a crisis to happen again; will they continue ignoring less quantifiable social benefits of an organization, or will they follow in the footsteps of Chrysler who, through a higher level of empowerment and less level of standardization, managed to reduce it’s time-to-market ratio at the same time as they managed to increase product quality significantly?  

An Alternative Strategy-Making Process

Continuing from my previous post, I would like to share some ideas on how strategies not necessarily have be the result of deliberate planning processes, but rather how they can blossom and emerge from every corner of the organization.

As far as I’m concerned, the concept of emerging strategies was first suggested by Henry Mintzberg in the 1980s. Since then, the concept has gained support both among researchers and business leaders who successfully have built their organizations around elements such as involvement, consistency, and adaptability.

Imagine a salesman visiting a customer. The product is not quite right, but together they work out some modifications to suit the customers’ needs. The salesman returns back to his office and puts the changes through. After a couple of more rounds with modification, they finally get it right; a new product emerges. This new product eventually opens up a new market. The company has changed strategic course. Is this event highly unlikely? Not if you ask those over at SAS Institute. Having appeared in the top 20 of Fortune’s 100 Best Companies to Work For list every year it’s been published, and with a turnover rate around 4 % compared to industry average of 20 %, and with a subscription renewal rate for their products on astonishing 98 %, SAS Institute should be a company to take notice of.

In short, SAS has learned to exploit the creative energies of all its stakeholders; managers, software developers as well as their customers! Their principles are driven by assumption that creative capital is not just a collection of individuals’ ideas, but a product of interaction. Their view is supported by Ronald Burt at University of Chicago who has shown that long-term relationships between employers and customers add to a company’s bottom line by increasing the likelihood of “productive accidents”.

In my opinion, the associations connected with the strategist have to change. The association of a senior manager sitting in an office formulating courses of actions for everyone else to implement went out of the door with the “great man” theory as far as I am concerned.

This is also supported by an experiment by Google who decided to track the development of the ideas generated by their management compared to the ideas generated by employees in lower levels in the organizations. Surprisingly (or maybe not) they found that the ideas generated by the latter category had a higher success ratio than the former one. The reason: Those working further down in the hierarchy were more frequent in touch with the market and are therefore better suited to predict future trends.

There are numerous of other examples of how strategies have emerged and how successful strategies can stem from other members of the organization than those sitting at the top. The question should be asked: Is it time to drop the traditional hierarchy of experience for a hierarchy of innovators? After all, those who are on top of the hierarchy of experience can only predict the future if the future mirrors the past. How likely is that?

How can we distinguish between good and poor strategy?

This question was raised on LinkedIn a while ago and received massive feedback from professionals from a wide variety of industries.

One of the respondents answered the question by referring to a blog by Roger Martin for Harvard Business Review and argues that a good strategy “provides the road map to future with data driven sign posts. It tells you what to do and which way to move forward depending upon key big events (e.g. if Event A occurs we will move to doing this and if Event B occurs then we will move to doing that)”.

This view gained a fair share of support in the discussion and other participants provided their insights by claiming that the major difference between a “good” and a “poor” strategy comes from the execution of the strategy. “An excellent strategy (on paper) which is poorly executed is always worse than a fair strategy which is exceptionally executed”, a participant claimed.

Another participant stressed the importance of building the strategy upon the company’s existing capabilities and resources and the opportunities and threats posed by the environment.

The reason why I found this discussion interesting is that, although strategy making goes thousands of years back, we are still struggling in defining the term – let alone distinguishing between a good and a poor strategy.

Furthermore, most of the answers on LinkedIn seemed to be made on the following two assumptions:

•         Strategy is prescriptive.
•         Strategies are developed at the top of the organization

Therefore, in my next posts I will challenge these two assumptions and come up with alternative strategy development processes.