Dear Editor,
The Trinidad & Tobago-based consulting group continues, unfortunately, to befuddle Guyanese readers of Stabroek Business (‘Performance management practices: It’s not an HR “thing,”‘ April 20) with their one-size-fits-all generic solutions to practical management issues that must be contextualized, lest we do more harm than good by any such generalized, text-book approach. With all due respect, I believe that my repeated caution is particularly poignant, having regard to the current topical discussions in Guyana about the rather unorthodox staffing practices of Guyana’s largest employer (viz the government) as well as the unconventional management practices in GuySuCo, an equally large employer facing some life-threatening operational and extremely challenging HR issues. In such a context, the very caption of the consulting group’s paper is at least counter-intuitive and potentially counter-productive.
The paper belabours the point that performance management is “the way of managing business” at all levels of the organization. Does this not beg the question of how you can manage at any level without HR inputs? Paradoxically, the writer raves about a book that talks about “how the power of the masses can change everything,” and asks the rhetorical question how to “leverage the power of the masses“ in a way that only adds confusion to my mind. Of course such a conundrum can lead to self-doubt, but I am strangely comforted by the writer’s own answer to the rhetoric about structure driving performance, when she went on to elaborate on the relevance of reporting relationships and flow of information through the right people at the right time, etc.
Finally, as I indicated in my earlier comments on the writer’s take on performance management, I am concerned about the unnecessary overburden of academia on what was promised as performance management practices, and therefore felt obliged to forewarn my compatriots accordingly.
Yours faithfully,
Nowrang Persaud
