See you in bell: How India Inc may rate its employees

Appraisal time – bell curve time. So, how will India Inc place its employees on the bell curve? Here are the main findings from a survey of last year’s salary revisions by 1,000 companies across 20 sectors. The survey was done by Aon, available exclusively with ET.

85% companies trusted the bell curve to appraise employees.

The curve is getting sharper — difference between top performers and the rest increasing.


But there’s still reluctance to put a lot of people in the bottom pile.

Difference between those graded ‘Meets Expectation (ME)’ and top performers increasing.

Last year, the average increment for MEs was 8.4%compared with the overall average of 9.3%.

Increments for those with top two grades — Far Exceeds Expectation and Exceeds Expectation — were on average 1.75x and1.38x that of MEs.

Aon says this pattern is here to stay. Here’s the detailed data:

FOR COMPANIES WHICH DON’T USE THE BELL CURVE
Continuous feedback, and managers supporting employees in areas of strengths and improvement are some options. But Aon research shows that many firms that have publicly done away with the bell curve still follow shadow ratings internally to manage performance management.