Platinum Solutions recently rolled out “Success Factors”, a web-based hosted application that we use for performance reviews and goal management. The company, SuccessFactors, touts their product as a “Performance & Talent Management” system. This system replaced a tired MS Word template that we have used for the past seven years.

I recently completed my first review for one of our superstar software developers named Navid. While I have sat through a lot of demo’s Success Factors when we were evaluating it for purchase, this was my first real hands-on use of the system.

Navid had previously logged into Success Factors and completed a self assessment and goal setting exercise. Then the system altered me via email that his review was ready for my input. I logged in and was able to see Navid’s self assessment, and in a side-by-side fashion I was able to provide my own ratings and comments. We had spent a lot of time preconfiguring a number of categories and measures, and we have a few different profiles so that, for example, a software developer will be evaluated against a group of technical measures, and a project manager will be evaluated against PM measures. Everyone is evaluated against the same base measures such as alignment with our core values, which are 5 non-negotiable qualities that we strive to exemplify.

It was clear that Navid had spent a lot of time on his own self-assessment. He provided excellent detail to support his rating on each measure. That level of detail made it very easy for me to provide my own ratings, I found myself nodding and thinking “oh yeah, he did do that”. While my ratings differed slightly from Navid’s based on my interpretation of the measure, his final review was not that far off from his self assessment.

I found the experience to be very efficient, and the final review was much more detailed then the paper form that we previously had used. I provided much better written feedback, and I was then able to set goals for Navid for the upcoming year. After I was done, I electronically routed it to Mary, or HR director, who gave it a review and then routed it to Navid.

This was more than just webifying a paper-based process. I believe that the process and workflow incorporated into the product produces a much higher quality evaluation. In addition, SuccessFactors has built a slick Web 2.0 interface that feels very agile even though there are a bunch of form elements and text boxes to scroll through. There are some nice touches, such as a little modal box that appears and warns you that your session is about to expire due to idle timeout, allowing you to save your work and stay logged in.

Now, I have to think that if Navid had not been so conscientious and thorough about doing his self assessment, the process would not have nearly been as smooth. If, for example, he has just went down the list and rated himself as “4. Exceeds Expectations” and not provided detailed comments, the process would have been a lot more ponderous and the final review would not nearly have been as good. Time will tell if other folks take as much time on their own reviews. While it is certainly in everyone’s best interest to provide the reviewer with as much information as possible, I can anticipate a certain percentage of our staff not providing a sufficient level of detail or providing realistic self evaluations. These folks will receive a less meaningful review, and I think will undoubtedly receive lower scoring than the people that do take the time to provide good written comments and realistic self assessments.

Implementing Success Factors is an important step towards our goal of revamping how we evaluate, promote, compensate, and reward our staff at Platinum Solutions. It is not the final step by any means – we have a lot more to plan and implement before we are going to be happy with the overall process. Figuring out the evaluation/compensation process is one of our most important and pressing goals, and I feel like if we can get this right, our other goals will fall into place.

By the way, if Success Factors had performed poorly or turned out to not be worth the investment, I would have said so. The truth is, Success Factors represents a significant improvement over our manual process, and I think it is well worth the investment.