Learning from Life

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The Process Work Institute is about to begin the process of applying for regional accreditation. My job is to help spearhead this process, and one of the tasks is to create assessments – of the programs, of student progress, of individual courses, and of faculty. I’ve been up to my elbows this summer studying the literature on program and faculty assessments, and I have to confess, there’s something about the logic in it all that’s appealing. Even though I’m a progressive education fan from way back (Antioch College ’81) the literature on aligning goals and outcomes and performance is refreshing. It’s something of a relief coming away from philosophies, ideologies and concepts of human development to the practicality of metrics and asking (and then defining!) does it work? [I also read Paul Tough’s book, Whatever it Takes, about Geoffrey Canada’s Harlem charter school as well as other books on recent charter schools’ successes in closing the achievement gap, and have newfound respect for the question, does it work?]

One of the big concepts in curriculum and assessment is alignment – aligning course goals with assignments, aligning those goals and assignments with assessments, aligning faculty evaluation with program goals, and aligning the data with its source – i.e., who is competent to weigh in on what aspect of the faculty member’s performance? Performance evaluation for faculty is a different breed then performance evaluation for employees in the business world, but not all that much. The concept and many methods are the same, with the exception of the 360 model, and the fact that faculty members aren’t managers and students aren’t ‘direct reports.’ However, the concept of alignment in faculty evaluation makes me realize that aligning performance with outcomes is a far more complex beast than I thought. In particular, the once a year review, 360, or evaluation of goals and accomplishments, strengths and weaknesses doesn’t connect our behavior sufficiently to its immediate result. In other words, our behavior and actions (what happens upstream) are separated by time, space, power differentials, and layers of bureaucracy from the results of our actions (what happens downstream).

Feedback is immediate, and immediately available to us, if we’re trained to read it, and not protected from it. Brain research tells us that only immediate feedback becomes new learning. If we want to learn how to do something differently, or to improve our performance, we need to be corrected in the midst of the erroneous behavior, and given a chance, immediately, to apply the new behavior and see the results. This is what creates a new pattern for behavior in our brain. One hour later, one week later, or one year later, a bunch of statements or data saying, “is a good team worker,” or “needs to improve communication skills” gives us absolutely nothing to work with. The best part about getting immediate feedback is that the focus is on what we do and the impact it has, not on some authority figure’s judgment about our behavior.

In the literature on parenting, there is a popular theory called natural consequences. Natural consequences means that what you do – your actions or behavior – has natural consequences. If you go outside when it’s raining without your raincoat, you’ll get wet. If you don’t take your muddy shoes off before coming in the house, you’ll get mud on the carpet. It’s an alternative to using arbitrary or power-based commands to control children – wear your raincoat because I say so.

The theory of natural consequences helps align our actions with their results. It represents the natural flow of events without interference of the manager, teacher or parent, removing a human authority figure from the equation, and letting nature or life be the lesson giver. One of the biggest stumbling blocks in performance evaluation is that the immediate results of our behavior and actions, the impact we have on other, and the results of our actions aren’t fed back to us directly. We don’t see the natural consequences; more likely, we receive the judgments and opinions of others about our behavior. Nature is missing. And yet, life constantly sends us feedback, a steady stream of signals and data about the results of our actions.

So, back to my task at hand. I’m still at the beginning, but this gives me ideas how to align performance evaluation with the natural flow of feedback – learning from life. Such a method would have to have these key elements in it:

1. Ongoing, integrated into the flow of work.  Immediate feedback and reflection is the key to learning. Feedback that is disconnected from our actions and dislocated in time and space cannot be used for learning. At best, it allows us to reflect and guess into its meaning, and perhaps also teaches us how to receive feedback and make the best use of it, but whether or not it has an impact on the behavior it’s meant to judge is anyone’s guess. A yearly review process which tracks how well we did meeting our own and our organization’s goals doesn’t give us a clue as to how we got there, or what specific behaviors brought us closer or created obstacles to achieving those goals. We can only surmise from the statements of others.
2. Social and relational. This one is hard, because of the power differential. Direct reports, students, or staff will have trouble giving direct feedback because of the possibility of retribution in the form of lower grades, demotion, or more covert forms of reprisals. However, what we do impacts others. And seeing the impact of communication, teaching, or engaging with others and whether it produces what we intend or not, is a powerful form of learning. There is no substitute from seeing what’s downstream from our actions, up close and personal.
3. Consequential, or results-oriented. Removing personality traits or judgments, and just focusing on results: do my actions achieve the results I intend? If not, I need to change.
4. Developmental. This kind of performance evaluation puts life in the role of authority, and we need to learn how to read the feedback to our actions. We need to be taught how to reflect on, review, and assess the feedback to our actions. It should be taught, reinforced, and become a part of a learning culture in the organization. Additionally, without a means to develop my areas of weakness, the evaluation becomes nothing more than a criticism. For instance, if I discover through the process that my skills in program design are poor, without a means to improve that, the evaluation is just a criticism. Evaluation needs to be one (small) piece of a total learning and development process.
5. Contextual and specific. Evaluating faculty is differentiated into different activities and skills: designing courses is not the same skill as delivering them. Advising and working directly with students requires different abilities than researching and writing. What we require of someone in one context may involve different, even contradictory behaviors, than what we require in another setting. Aligning evaluation with specific context, and the goals and values of that context
6. Personally relevant. This goes without saying, and yet, it’s often overlooked. My own developmental goals need to be part of the picture. I’m not going to be able to relate meaningfully and engage with enthusiasm in a process that doesn’t inspire me or connect me to my own path of growth. Where and how do my developmental goals fit in, and how can this process serve my goals?

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