The first case package explains the details of Morgan Stanley's new 360-degree performance review process that the company has adopted as part of its restructuring efforts. Feedback would be solicited from the employee's peers, subordinates, superiors, and internal customers, as well as from the employee himself. Employees would be assessed in the areas of Market and Professional Skills, Management and Leadership Ability, Business Orientation and Teamwork/Single Company Contribution. All response data from these responses would then be compiled into an evaluation and development summary that would serve as the basis for future promotion decisions for the particular employee. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay The second case package details the background, successes, and struggles of a market coverage professional recently hired for Morgan Stanley named Rob Parson. Paul Nasr, Parson's supervisor, was struggling to interpret the results of Parson's evaluation as he pondered the role Parson should play in the organization's future. Morgan Stanley's restructuring had placed enormous emphasis on instilling teamwork and respect for business processes. Parson, while very successful in generating new business and exploiting deals that benefited Morgan Stanley's bottom line, seemed to have difficulty embracing the company culture. This was often noted by those who took part in his evaluation process, and as a result, responses regarding Parson's performance for the organization were mostly negative. He had been deemed too aggressive and unwilling to “follow procedure” and “play by the rules”. Nasr needed to determine whether recommending Parson for a top management role would be beneficial to Morgan Stanley's long-term goals. I personally appreciate many aspects offered by the new 360-degree evaluation system. I like the fact that everyone in the organization involved with the employee, whether bosses, colleagues or lower-level workers, has the opportunity to provide input. I also like that the system template clearly provides four structured areas by which the employee should be classified. This should make it very clear to the employee receiving the evaluation which areas he or she is highly competent in and which areas could benefit from improvement. However, I believe there could be potential issues with the accuracy of the feedback. Although the case text mentioned that positive comments are often clearly worded while negative comments are sometimes “softly” written, I will refer to what I mentioned in this week's discussion post. If raters know the employee on a level external to the organization (which is highly likely in most cases), there is a possibility that the feedback could be biased to represent the rater's positive or negative opinion of the employee on a non-organizational basis. This may make it difficult to determine which comments and feedback are truly accurate. I believe Rob Parson's three strengths can be summarized as follows: 1) a strong ability to communicate with both potential and existing customers, 2) a high success rate in building business deals and generating incremental revenue for the company, and 3) demonstration of a strong commitment to the growth and development of the organization through achievementindividual (pulling one's weight). I believe Parson's three areas of development can be summarized as follows: 1) need to show more interest and initiative in working with team members to achieve goals rather than continuing with such an individualistic approach, 2) need to treat colleagues and collaborators with greater respect; in particular, it must ask for their input and efforts when necessary, as dictated by organizational policy, and 3) it must learn to appreciate that Morgan Stanley's organizational mission consists of more than just building the business from a financial perspective. There's no question that Parson's style and personality differ greatly from that of the typical investment banker, so it's no surprise that his actions have caused so much friction. I find it interesting that, numerically, Parson scores are relatively high from both managers and peers. However, negative comments in the open section seem to be plentiful. This could perhaps amount to the following statement: “It's doing what it's supposed to do, but we just don't like the way it's doing it.” From both managers and colleagues, it appears that both quantitative and qualitative reviews of his technical or "hard" skills are overwhelming. However, it is clear that its people and “soft” skills need further development for Parson to maximize its organizational effectiveness. I believe Parson should be promoted to a senior management position within Morgan Stanley. He has demonstrated that his ability to generate growth and revenue for the company is different from that of all his peers, and his leadership could create the opportunity for Morgan Stanley to capture greater market share across all the different sectors in which serves customers. However, I believe Parson should (voluntarily and passionately) participate in a variety of leadership development and communication building activities to become a fully effective manager. In other words, I believe that Morgan Stanley should recognize the value it brings to the organization (hard skills) by providing it with ways to acquire elements of value that the company believes it should use more regularly (soft skills). Training and development activities to improve Parson's soft skills are the only thing standing between the current situation and Parson's full ability to have a dramatic impact on Morgan Stanley. If you were Paul Nasr, how would you plan to lead the performance appraisal conversation? What would your goals be? What issues would you raise and why, and how would you raise them? If I were Nasr, I would definitely realize that it's time to get a little tougher on Parson regarding his areas of development and improvement. I would like to describe that the development of his leadership and communication skills have been absolutely crucial to his advancement, and that all suggestions given to him should now be taken seriously to best position himself for promotion. I almost intended to instill some fear in him: "make the changes we've asked of you, otherwise your future with this organization will be bleak." I would like to mention that he needs to treat colleagues with more respect and include them more in projects so that he can instill a sense of teamwork. I would mention that he needs to more fully embrace mission statements and company goals by softening his style and "playing by the rules" on all projects or assignments. I would also like to mention that his leadership skills should appeal to a much wider range of voters in one role.