Does Microsoft do stack ranking?
Does Microsoft still do stack ranking for reviews? I had read an article saying they were doing away with this, but also read on Glassdoor that it still exists. Any insight would be appreciated. #microsoft
What went away was the forced curve. Before it was common that 2 people with arguably the same performance/impact would be placed in different reward buckets to hit the curve. That went away.
Tell that to my HR rep. We always “balance” and it looks a suspiciously close to standard distribution bell curve.
So youre saying its more like a flexible curve? Top microsoft says a 140 must get balanced with a 60.
That’s exactly right, there are some nuances. But the budget always gets balanced, mainly because some unpopular blokes get selected to be zero rewards, that really helps balance.
That’s not exactly true. The strict curve went away. Each VP can impose distribution constraints including how many people they expect in each bucket. Then during calibrations people are moved into buckets (up or down) to meet the distribution constraints. For example, more people in 200% or in 60%. One VP had a rule of nobody in 80% bucket. Others forced 12% in the 180/200 buckets. Any constraints like these will indirectly force a curve because you have to meet budget.
👆yep this. So when people throw their hands up and say “oh no curve” they don’t understand the subjective bs which is the truth stated here.
Sounds like the article was bs. They just replaced stack ranking with a modified version
What did you expect? There’s a limited budget, and it’s not called profit sharing.
I’m a ❄️. Upset that this was posted: https://blog.impraise.com/360-feedback/microsoft-throws-stack-ranking-out-the-window . And it’s fake PR.
I expect the budget to be managed like it should be. If you are capable of earning 20%, budget should be there for it. And for 30%, 40% etc Budget should reflect everybody getting 200%. Now we know this isn’t the case, so then managers work out how their employees landed which puts the control into the managers hands, not HR/Finance trying to “balance the budget” If my team killed it and delivered in a huge way, then why shouldn’t they all get 200%? Sounds motivating for the next year. It’s like winning the super bowl. You know it doesn’t happen every season, but the hope that it can happen would be enough for teams to really work for it. Today, what’s the motivation? Work your ass off for 140%?
There is no stack ranking (aka forced curve), there is a budget which m2s and above have to adhere to.
You’re saying the same thing. A forced budget which doesn’t have everybody getting 200% is a forced curve.
No. There. Is. No. Forced. Curve. You could put everyone at zero, therefore there is no forced curve, you could put everyone at 100% therefor there is no forced curve. You could put half at zero and half at 200%, therefore there is not a forced curve. If you put everyone at 200% you would have to probably talk to your manager and skip to justify it and try and get budget, or you might be get get told to alter things to make the budget work, but you could decide to lower everyone, or lower one person massively or stick to your guns and just submit it and let your manager sort it out. Obviously if you plot your team rewards on a graph you could fit a curve to it, but what that curve looks like isn't defined. You have a budget, a forced curve states, *how* you must use that budget, but at msft there is no prescribed way to use your budget, because there is no forced curve to fit against.
While stack ranking is not being enforced, peanut buttering is not being prevented either. If anything I hate the latter more than the other. While stack ranking can be unjust at times. Weak managers often resort to peanut butter ING,with which is fucking unfair. At the end of the day you have a fixed pie that you need to divide amongst multiple people. Solve that!
You would rather have hard working people not get the rewards they deserve because sometimes slackers get a little extra money? Please leave management.
Do managers have to force people into PIP or Dev Plan based on stack ranking?
Yes of course. You’re stacked against the other people in your band under your GM/Partner. If one person gets a 140, another person HAS to receive a 60 to balance. So good people who otherwise would get good rewards get screwed.
They use to do this at Cisco and did away with it. I HATED it.