Do you do individual performance reviews in your startup?

[justinchen]

In large companies it's pretty standard procedure to do performance reviews. At HP we did 360 degree evaluations where your peers gave feedback to your boss who delivered the news to you.

What do startups and small businesses typically do for performance reviews? When there's only 3 people or so anonymous feedback isn't really anonymous, but it seems like a good process to have to keep people growing individually. How are others handling this?

[cschneid]

I'm also interested in how small companies handle performance reviews. I've worked for 2 small companies, and find that they can be more opaque than a large company, since the boss is often pulled in a dozen directions, and performance feedback can be rare.

Is there a good way for small companies to do this? This exact issue came up in my head today as a "startup" idea to investigate. Do other companies feel this pain?

[justinchen → cschneid]

The other thing with small companies is that the hierarchy is much flatter and people tend to be closer so there's the worry of spoiling the working relationship.

[cschneid → justinchen]

I understand what you're saying there, but I feel that small companies are worse at setting performance goals and reviews than large companies, simply due to the fact that the "boss" is pulled in so many directions. Can a software tool make that easier or more transparent?

[neilc]

We did periodic performance reviews at the startup I worked for (which had about 15 employees at the time). It wasn't anonymous: I wrote up a document that evaluated my own performance and how I felt about the working environment, and my boss and I went over it together. I found it quite useful, and it was a good opportunity to step back from the daily routine, discuss plans for my future within the company, and set goals for the next year. One thing that I felt was important was that my boss really took the time to think about the work I'd done, and gave me some legitimately useful suggestions for improvement (the feedback wasn't just "Work harder.", for example).

[YuriNiyazov]

One thing I can say is that in my previous startup we did not do co-founder performance reviews, and it hurt us immensely. I haven't been able to figure out how to do appropriately critical or praiseful performance reviews, but I think that it is tremendously important.