What truly matters when evaluating employees?

- Imagine being at a job where you have more skills than your teammates, but nowhere to advance to. All the titles above you are already filled and it doesn't look like anybody's ready to leave anytime soon. If the organization that you work for doesn't reinvent how it defines employee value chances are you'll have no choice but to leave. How taking a skills first approach to defining employee value opens up career opportunities and increases productivity. And you don't need a survey to tell you that when that happens employees are more engaged and they stay longer. Employee value is most appropriately defined by the results employees can bring to their work. Those results are directly tied to specific skill sets that can be evaluated, improved and rewarded through compensation or otherwise. Past experience, titles, and even degrees are meaning less and less over time. Today's employees aren't interested in chasing promotions as much as they're looking for career development. Most employees realize that they need upgraded skills in order to remain successful. That's because skill development is the ultimate job security and opportunity. Managements jobs will be to increase employee value by aligning organization and departmental goals with the ever-evolving employee skillset. Nowhere in this course will you see me undermine the inherent value of experience. As the joke goes, the plumber charge is $150 to turn a bolt below your sink. Simply because from experience, he knows where the problem lies. What won't be helpful is when plumbing manufacturers create devices that don't break down and essentially take away half or more of their plumbers work in order to survive, even that plumber's going to have to learn new skills. The bottom line experience matters, but only when and where experience matters. For example, when I was a trial lawyer experienced and trying cases mattered, but only to a point, for a pilot experience matters, but only to a point and titles matter only where titles matter. For example, it would be hard to run a military organization without them, but to limit an employee's progress in most organizations because of an antiquated org chart, no way, we can also do a better job rewarding employees in the present for increasing their skills and value. Waiting for an annual review doesn't cut it anymore. More skills, more value, more pay. Look, I realize that any time an organization goes through monumental change like this they're bound to be resistors, doubters, and those literally in fear of being evaluated in a new way. Getting past this resistance requires a clear and communicated commitment from leadership. It also requires an inclusive dialogue with employees to address their concerns and come to agreements around just what makes an employee valuable. I'll finish with this thought. When I ran my small organization, I created a form for my employees entitled, Why I Deserve a Raise. They could present it to me at any time and it required them to show how they added value. It may be based on developing a new skillset or exceeding some performance expectations. It was very effective and helped employees focus on what was most important. And you know what? I love giving my employees raises when they added more value.