For those not familiar with Deming, his philosophy in this regard is that there are say 10% of people who are superlative, 10% who are terrible and who need to leave, and 80% who are pretty much the same.
That may be true for factories - I have no experience - but it is not true for companies loaded with high achievers with advanced degrees.
Lots of companies out here have a requirement that 5% of people get classified as unsatisfactory - which is particularly stupid after a layoff. There are often forced distributions of ratings. Money is a totally different issue.
Voyager, you’re right. In all of the companies I’ve worked for in the last decade, they all apply Deming’s theory to our performance appraisal rankings. I’ve had bosses tell me straight up that I am really better than they had to rank me (or that they ranked me high and upper management knocked me down some points) because only one person on the team is allowed to “exceed expectations”. The concept that you might have two or more exemplary workers on one team is apparently unbelievable to the HR folks. But I’m also getting cynical enough to think they do actually understand that it’s wrong, but it’s an excuse they can point to for not promoting people. It looks to me like there’s been much role stagnation in corporate America in the last decade (along with downsizing) and companies are really super reluctant to promote anybody.
I worked for one place, a major corporation, for over 9 years and couldn’t even get a rank promotion. I was hired as a software engineer III and finally called it quits after they dicked me around for three years on a promotion to level IV. (The title ranks went from 1 to 6, so I was still in the middle of the range.) That was after 9 years of consistent exceeds expectations (interspersed by the occasional “meets expectations” because “we have to let someone else exceed now”). Complete bullshit.
The forced curve. Jack Welsh popularized this at GE. It was abandoned after he left. And I remember reading an interview with Jack where he said the forced curve aka managing out the bottom 5% every year was something he would not do again if he was in the same position.
It sucks being in a company that does this and it destroys morale. The out performers feel every one breathing down their necks, the ones that didn’t quite make out performer feel like they were screwed, those in the pack think the next step is being one of the 5%, and the 5% are just fucked. Everyone knows good people that got whacked undeservedly. And then you end up in a situation when every one in the company knows they are one cranky manager or review away from being let go. Not a real good motivator.
I forgot about that, Deming’s theory mostly applies to factories? I remember the quality control part that if someone finds a problem with the work, it should be returned to the person who caused the problem so they fix it instead of having someone else fix it. Also, that the greater numbers of layers added to do testing the lower the quality of the product. Yup, sounds like factory-speak. 
Classifying 5% as always being unsatisfactory is a never ending situation, because there is always going to be a bottom 5%. I think management likes formulas like this, because then they don’t have to think. The bottom 5% always costs the company money, and it’s stupid in my opinion not to bring them up to whatever level the job demands.
I was never a fan of taking all the people in an area, like a department, and ranking everyone there from top to bottom. Some jobs are extremely important, but they aren’t glamorous, so they don’t get the attention for management to fight to get them to the top. The ranking situation works against the company’s interest, because it doesn’t encourage the team work concept they preach, but people to compete against each other by being information hiders, and do lots of grand-standing about the most trivial things of their work so all of management remembers them. It also encourages credit thieves. Again, none of these things help the company and the shareholders.
This is why before applying for any job, see how the company is reviewed in places like Glassdoor and during the interview ask how performance is evaluated. If it’s done in some method you don’t agree with, at least you know what you are getting into.
So much for bragging over low turnover in their workforce, if management routinely sweeps out what they consider to be in the bottom 5%. Sounds like unnecessary churn.
Sure, but there are enough absolutely and completely vague prohibitions in most of them that are sort of “Get out of jail free” cards for employers to shit-can people on flimsy pretexts.
I mean, everywhere I’ve ever worked since the Internet has been a thing, has had some kind of prohibition on using your work computers for personal matters, or in using the internet for anything other than work related stuff.
In practice, this is observed more in the breach than in reality, but I have no doubt that if they really wanted to fire you, they could easily cite that and the fact that you looked at CNN one day at 2:45 in the afternoon during the World Cup or something.
It really depends on the company, and the role of any unions. Some organizations have developed such a bureaucracy that you really can fight back by knowing and being able to use the regulations.
This is really good advice.
The most satisfactory system I have seen is what we called natural ranking. We had an infinite number of bands (or as many as people) and we started by having managers nominate someone for the top band. My boss had a policy that if you couldn’t decide who was better than whom in the band after five minutes, you ranked them together. It wasn’t perfect but it worked pretty well, especially since there was a lot of movement among groups so many people had been managed by more than one manager. And no forced bottom 5%. I actually left those meetings feeling good. Salary administration, however, was almost always a pain.
Another place I worked did have a 5% requirement, and one person was forced into that slot. He wasn’t even in my group, but it made me so sick I headed out the door immediately thereafter.
Tech company or no? The last few places I’ve worked had a policy that you had to do your work, of course, but anything you wouldn’t mind someone else seeing over your shoulder is okay.
And they put the World Cup on the projector right after a meeting one day - a meeting with a VP present.
Seems like a spectacularly perverse misreading of Deming.
Pretty much the exact opposite of his intent.
Good observation Nicky. If readers want to see the 14 point Deming model, scroll down on his Wikipedia page: W. Edwards Deming - Wikipedia
After working in HR for 30 years having also started in 1985, one thing I’ve learned is that a lot of HR people suck at math. 
Just having a dig. I pretty much agree with everything you’ve said in regard to HR and the thread seems to be going on a different tilt so I’ll just add in a few extra points from my personal perspective.
HR is definitely there to support the organisation first. That doesn’t always mean making it look good, sometimes you need to take action that may not make it look good but stops it looking really bad.
A key thing to remember is that generally HR advises and makes recommendations to upper management, not makes decisions. At least that’s how it is where I’ve worked. So you may well make recommendations that are over ruled. That’s fine, my job is to make sure the potential consequences of the decision were understood and taken into account in the decision making.
With employee grievances, it can get delicate. My preferred MO is to use the internal consultant model so when an employee has a grievance they should take that to their manager in the first instance and I provide advice to the manager on the correct process and steps to deal with the grievance appropriately.
If the grievance is about the manager then come to me and I’ll take it from there. If we have a person in a management job who is mistreating employees, that’s not in the best interests of the company and it needs to be dealt with.
We do have some legislation that needs to be considered regarding protected disclosure and defined bullying, harrassment and discrimination stuff etc. So while HR is not the employee advocate we also are not there to cover up poor management practice. If I invetigate allegations and decide a manager needs to be disciplined, I take those recommendations to the appropriate more senior management. If they don’t want to act then I take it to the CEO. if they don’t want to act then i reconsider if this is the place I want to work.