It's the most wonderful time of the year … for year-end reviews and compensation discussions. While these reviews serve an important purpose, if not conducted thoughtfully, they can allow managers to unconsciously reflect biases in their evaluations. Indeed, with new COVID and AI-related guidance from the EEOC in recent months, employers have a lot to consider heading into 2022.

• What risks do performance reviews pose to employers?

Oftentimes, supervisors are asked to rate employees based on a generic form or template evaluation. While this format may streamline the review process for HR, it robs the reviewer of having a sincere discussion of what the employee is doing well or where there is room for improvement. In addition, these template reviews open the door for biases to sneak into play. These biases can make people feel less included and may affect how diverse employees are treated in the performance-review process, and in the organization overall.

It's important to note that you should communicate to employees whether there is any compensation adjustment tied to the performance-review process. The last thing you want is for people to assume that if they have a positive review, they will receive a raise or bonus, if that's not the case.

• How can employers avoid biases influencing their evaluations?

The first place to start is to coordinate metrics. There's always going to be a degree of subjectivity to an evaluation via form, but honing in on specific performance analytics and cross-referencing those with job descriptions and review documentation will help managers gain a clear perspective on the nature of the work being done. For example, if an employee is expected to make 15 widgets, and 15 is an acceptable performance, and they made the 15 widgets, but the employee receives a negative performance review, management is equipped to ask follow-up questions based on data. You want to see consistency between performance data and review outcomes. You also want to track for consistency with past reviews, and dig in to any apparent discrepancies.