I came across this study and thought it was pretty interesting. 77% of leaders believe performance reviews are valuable, yet 67% believe eliminating them would either improve results or make no difference. That got me thinking about the difference between evaluating people and actually helping them improve. In baseball, we spend a lot of time evaluating players. We have reports, data, grades, and meetings. All of that has value, but identifying where someone needs to improve doesn’t mean we’ve actually helped them get better. To me, evaluation should be the starting point. What matters is what we do with that information. Do we have a clear plan? Does the person understand it? Are we helping them make progress? And are we checking whether it’s working? I’m curious how others approach this. What’s something you’ve seen organizations spend a lot of time evaluating or measuring without actually doing much to improve it?

On our mentorship call, we kept coming back to asking “why” five times to get specific about what we can actually influence and change. Not everything matters equally, and our job is to find the one thing that will make the biggest difference. Then ask, is this a thought we need to influence, a skill we need to develop, or a physical capability they’re missing? That should drive what we do, otherwise we’re shooting at the wrong target and hoping it works. Think about someone you’re coaching right now. Do you know what’s holding them back, or have you stopped at the first explanation?

𝗛𝗢𝗪 𝗗𝗢 𝗣𝗘𝗢𝗣𝗟𝗘 𝗘𝗫𝗣𝗘𝗥𝗜𝗘𝗡𝗖𝗘 𝗬𝗢𝗨 𝗔𝗙𝗧𝗘𝗥 𝗔 𝗠𝗜𝗦𝗧𝗔𝗞𝗘? We want people to be honest with us. How we respond when they mess up has a lot to do with whether they will be. Here’s a baseball example. A player is working daily on not swinging at pitches outside the strike zone. He cares and is bought in. Eighth inning, a chance to score a teammate. He swings at a low slider and strikes out. As he walks back, I can meet him with, “You have to be better.” Or let him settle, then ask, “Walk me through what happened.” He already knows he messed up. My response can help him work through it or leave him feeling like he needs to defend himself. 𝐀𝐬 𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐬, 𝐰𝐞 𝐡𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐭𝐨 𝐬𝐞𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐚 𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐤𝐞 𝐟𝐫𝐨𝐦 𝐚𝐧 𝐚𝐬𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐩𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐚𝐛𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐨𝐧𝐞’𝐬 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐦𝐢𝐭𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭. The standard still matters. So do the timing, setting, and our willingness to understand before correcting. His answer, once the emotions calm down, lead me to the next step. Handle this wrong and people start putting up walls. What comes to mind when you think of this? A person, a story? Let me know what you think about after reading this and as always comment any questions you have!

Interested in your thoughts around tranferrable training environments to replicate game speed and game demands? What has worked well and what hasn't? Is simply the experience/exposure of games the biggest factor to handle what the game demands.

I was entering my third year with a team when new leadership came in. They chose to keep me, in part because of my content and relationships with the players. I’d spent the previous year addressing the team and building our identity and focus. Then they wanted to stop me from meeting with primarily those same players. The concern was that I would confuse them. There were also concerns about too many words on my slides and the wrong font. It felt like crap! I was confused and felt like I lost my voice. They valued what I brought enough to keep me, but I was losing the opportunity to contribute it. I’m not above feedback. If the slides need work, let’s improve them. If the message needs alignment, let’s get clear on it. I can work within a direction without needing every detail to be my choice. 𝐁𝐮𝐭 𝐡𝐚𝐯𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐩𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐛𝐢𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐲 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐡𝐚𝐯𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐨𝐰𝐧𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐩 𝐚𝐫𝐞𝐧’𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐚𝐦𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠. Research on employee voice offers a related lesson: people can hold back useful ideas when they believe speaking up is risky or inappropriate. Silence doesn’t necessarily mean they have nothing to contribute. When people can't influence their environment, they shut down and give in to the status quo. As leaders, we need to consider what our decisions teach people about how much their judgment is actually wanted. Set the direction. Be clear about the standards. Agree on when to check progress. Then give people room to do the job and support them when they need it. 𝐖𝐡𝐞𝐧 𝐡𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐟𝐞𝐥𝐭 𝐭𝐫𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐝 𝐞𝐧𝐨𝐮𝐠𝐡 𝐭𝐨 𝐝𝐨 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐛𝐞𝐬𝐭 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤? 𝐖𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐝𝐢𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫 𝐝𝐨?