Exclusive: Why Deloitte scrapped appraisals

Deloitte have piloted a system across seven Deloitte member firms – including in the UK, where 1,500 employees have participated – where the staff appraisal system has been removed.

Alec Bashinsky, Global Talent Partner at Deloitte, speaks to HR Grapevine about the decision, which was first considered in 2014: “We recognised that, across the firm, thousands of hours of our people’s time were being invested in a process that was not effective.  These thousands of hours equated to millions of pounds in cost, and resulted in a dissatisfying experience for many of our people, as they worked their way through a highly administrative process.

“We recognise that real-time feedback is valued by our people, but our existing system meant this was all loaded to one period of time in the year, and primarily focused on determining a rating for each employee.  We wanted something that was both more meaningful to our people’s sense of recognition and ongoing development, and which removed the admin.”

Before the initiative was launched, workforce surveys were conducted: “We found a consistent response – people did not like the current approach.  It was cumbersome, and was seen by many as a box-ticking exercise rather than a valuable contribution to career development.”