Watching the Senate confirmation hearings for Todd Blanche today made me smile.
After all, he’s been serving as Acting Attorney General since April. At this point, the confirmation hearing feels less like a job interview and more like a performance review.
That got me thinking about how most organizations evaluate performance.
Many leaders spend an entire year waiting for a formal review cycle before having a meaningful conversation with an employee about how they’re doing. It’s become such a normal practice that we rarely question it. HR has been encouraging more frequent feedback for years, but many leaders still treat performance management as something that happens on a calendar rather than in a relationship.
It seems backward.
If I’m leading someone well, I shouldn’t need a formal review to tell me whether they’re performing or what they’re capable of becoming. I should already know. Not because I’m keeping score, but because we’ve had enough conversations, solved enough problems together, and built enough trust that their performance and potential are never a mystery.
Performance reviews still have a purpose. Organizations need documentation, consistency, and decisions about compensation. But they should summarize what both people already know—not surprise either of them.
A good leader shouldn’t discover someone’s performance once a year.
They should simply record what they’ve been observing all along.
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