Believe it or not, people want to hear constructive criticism, even if managers don’t like to give it! 

Research has shown that how feedback is delivered is what really matters; more than 90% people surveyed said that negative feedback, if delivered appropriately, is effective at improving performance (HBR, 2014).

How am I doing? How can I improve? It’s old news by now that young employees desire immediate and constant feedback. Today, most of us have become accustomed to instant evaluations and answers with Yelp, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and the other numerous digital communication options. 

Consequently, the old standard yearly review has evolved. Although most businesses implement performance rewards on an annual basis, according to agribusinesses that responded to AgCareers.com’s latest HR Review, more than 20% of them review employee performance on a quarterly or even monthly basis. 

A standard employee review process provides a straightforward way for you to evaluate and provide performance-based rewards. The performance evaluation process is applicable for every size of business, from small farms to multi-national corporations. Nearly 80% of agribusinesses said they have a structured performance system in place and almost 90% said this performance system was linked to a reward.

Managers should be communicating positive and negative feedback to employees on a regular basis and not saving all of it for the employee review.  Employee reviews, or performance appraisals, are an opportunity for positive recognition and restatement of the critical points. 

Reviews are important to your business, but also to your employees: 

Your employees want to hear how they are doing and it’s important they hear it from you! This provides further opportunity for feedback, which supports employee growth and development.

When it comes down to it, performance reviews should not be used as a time to take out frustrations and criticisms on employees. This is how performance reviews got the negative connotation and do nothing for the business or employee.  Make sure you are communicating both praise and constructive criticism throughout the year and not saving it all for evaluation time.

There should be no surprises during a performance review! 

For additional valuable information, see our Managing Talent blogs here at FarmFutures.com, or visit www.AgCareers.com. 

The opinions of the author are not necessarily those of Farm Futures or Farm Progress.