How to Adopt Deloitte’s Performance Management Process
A few years ago, some Deloitte managers found themselves spending countless hours preparing for year-end reviews. They sifted through project notes, rating forms, and email feedback—only to realize that these annual appraisals were too backward-looking to truly benefit employee development. This was one of the driving forces behind Deloitte’s decision to transform its performance management system into something more agile, continuous, and growth-oriented.
Why Deloitte Decided to Change
For a long time, Deloitte—like many large organizations—relied on an annual appraisal model. Managers and employees would meet once a year to discuss goals, ratings, and performance summaries. However, as Deloitte grew and took on more diverse projects, leaders observed:
- Excessive Time on Paperwork: Both managers and employees spent hours collecting data and filling out detailed forms.
- Delayed Feedback: Waiting until the end of the year to provide performance insights meant missed opportunities to address concerns or recognize achievements in real time.
- Misaligned Goals: A single set of annual objectives often became irrelevant as business priorities shifted over the course of a year.
Realizing the need for a more dynamic approach, Deloitte reimagined its process to provide timely, constructive feedback that aligns with the rapid pace of client engagements.
Elements of Deloitte’s New Performance Management System
Deloitte’s revamped performance management framework focuses on three main areas:
- Frequent Check-Ins - Instead of waiting for an annual review, managers and employees are encouraged to have ongoing conversations about goals, performance, and development needs. These short, structured discussions ensure issues are addressed promptly and successes are celebrated in the moment.
- Forward-Looking Feedback - Discussions emphasize what an employee can do next, rather than dwelling solely on past results. By focusing on upcoming projects or future opportunities, managers guide team members toward strategies for improvement and skill-building.
- Strengths-Based Assessment - Deloitte places particular emphasis on identifying and leveraging each individual’s strengths. This approach fosters higher engagement and productivity by encouraging employees to excel in areas where they naturally perform well.
Under Deloitte’s updated process, managers may use brief, targeted questions to guide discussions:
- “Which project outcomes are you most proud of this quarter?”
- “What skills or knowledge would help you excel in your next engagement?”
- “Are there obstacles to your success that we can address together?”
The shift toward more conversational check-ins has been well-received. Employees are encouraged to offer their own insights, including personal progress updates and suggestions for future development paths. Managers, in turn, share feedback with the goal of guiding growth rather than simply assigning ratings.
Measuring Success: Key Outcomes
Deloitte tracks several metrics to evaluate the effectiveness of its performance management overhaul:
- Employee Engagement and Retention: Early data suggests that regular check-ins correlate with higher engagement scores and lower turnover rates.
- Project Performance: Frequent feedback and goal realignments appear to positively influence project outcomes and client satisfaction.
- Manager-Empowered Culture: Managers who engage in continuous coaching report stronger team cohesion and a deeper understanding of individual team members’ strengths.
While Deloitte continues to refine its processes, the general consensus is that the new system has made performance discussions more meaningful and impactful.
Implementing a Similar Framework with PerformYard
For organizations interested in replicating Deloitte’s approach, PerformYard offers a complete solution to streamline and enhance performance management:
- Customized Check-Ins - PerformYard allows managers to schedule regular one-on-one conversations or group check-ins, ensuring feedback becomes an ongoing process rather than an annual event.
- Goal Alignment and Tracking - With real-time goal-setting features, consulting firms can dynamically update objectives whenever project priorities change, much like Deloitte does with its agile approach.
- Centralized Feedback Repository - PerformYard consolidates feedback from peers, managers, and clients in one place. This not only simplifies documentation but also provides a comprehensive view of an employee’s contributions across multiple projects.
- Strengths-Focused Reviews - Through customizable review templates, organizations can emphasize identifying and building on employee strengths, mirroring Deloitte’s practice of spotlighting high-impact behaviors.
- Analytics and Reporting - PerformYard offers analytical dashboards to track engagement, check-in frequency, and progress against goals. This data can inform leadership decisions and measure the effectiveness of the new system over time.
By leveraging PerformYard’s user-friendly tools, business consulting companies can adopt many of Deloitte’s best practices—frequent check-ins, real-time feedback loops, and strength-oriented evaluations—without having to build an entire performance management platform from scratch.
Looking Ahead
Deloitte’s transformation exemplifies how even a large, global organization can shift from a traditional, annual review system to a more dynamic, development-focused model. By intertwining frequent check-ins, forward-looking feedback, and strengths-based assessments, the firm has created a performance management approach that not only supports employees’ growth but also adapts to changing business needs.
As the marketplace continues to evolve, Deloitte plans to refine its processes, leveraging employee input and technological advances to ensure the system remains as effective and efficient as possible. For other organizations evaluating their own performance appraisal system, Deloitte’s journey offers a roadmap for fostering a culture of continuous improvement and real-time development—ultimately benefiting both employees and the organization as a whole.
Example Questions for Deloitte Performance Reviews
Below are sample Deloitte performance review questions that reflect the firm’s focus on frequent feedback, strengths-based conversations, and forward-looking guidance. While not official Deloitte questions, they’re in line with Deloitte’s approach of continuous coaching and agile goal-setting:
- Performance & Achievements
- “Which recent project or task do you feel most proud of, and what led to your success?”
- “What challenges did you face, and how did you overcome them?”
- Strengths & Development
- “What strengths do you believe contributed most to your recent successes?”
- “Which areas of your skill set do you want to further develop or refine?”
- Goal Alignment & Impact
- “How well do you feel your current goals align with the firm’s or client’s objectives?”
- “Are there any adjustments needed to ensure you remain on track with shifting project priorities?”
- Forward-Looking Focus
- “What are your top priorities for the next quarter, and what resources would help you achieve them?”
- “How can we leverage your strengths in upcoming engagements or projects?”
- Collaboration & Team Dynamics
- “Which team members or stakeholders have you collaborated with effectively, and what made that collaboration work?”
- “Are there any communication or collaboration barriers we can address to improve team performance?”
- Client & Stakeholder Feedback
- “Have you received any feedback (formal or informal) from clients or peers that we should discuss?”
- “What lessons can we draw from client feedback to enhance our future delivery?”
- Career Path & Personal Growth
- “What are your long-term career aspirations, and how can we integrate those goals into your current role?”
- “Are there any specific training, certifications, or experiences you’d like to pursue to reach the next stage in your career?”
- Support & Resources
- “Do you feel you have the right tools, support, and time to meet your performance goals?”
- “What additional resources or feedback loops might help you perform at your best?”
Example Deloitte Performance Review Template
Below is an example of a Deloitte-inspired performance review template in a table format. While not an official Deloitte document, it captures key elements—frequent feedback, strengths-focused discussion, and forward-looking questions—that align with Deloitte’s performance management philosophy.
Despite its simplicity, there's tremendous sophistication built into Deloitte's questions.
Reviewers evaluate what they know
Deloitte asks questions that managers already know the answers to. This is one of those simple changes that seems so obvious in retrospect that you know it is brilliant.
Imagine a scenario, a new pizza place has opened in town and you are trying to determine if you should go. You could ask your friend, who has been, about the cheese stretch (1-5), dough crunch (1-5) and sauce tang (1-5), or you could ask your friend whether they liked the pizza and whether they plan to go back. If you ask about pizza characteristics your friend is annoyed and has to micro-analyze the pizza experience in a way they are not prepared for. If you ask whether they liked the pizza you don’t take up much of their time and they're prepared to give you an answer.
When we ask managers about employee skills and attributes, they have to answer questions they don’t already know the answers to. And it is even worse that that, Deloitte found that scores for skills have more to do with the reviewer than they do with the employee. For example, a manager's feelings about critical reasoning skills greatly impacts the scores they give for critical reasoning. Managers don’t like rating employees on skills, and it turns out they are horrible at it too.
That is why all four of Deloitte's questions are about things the manager should already have an answer for.
Less time more often
Deloitte has team leaders fill out their short review after every project or quarter, whichever is more frequent. These more frequent reviews give the company more data points about their employees' performance over time, and they spread out feedback over the whole year for a more accurate annual score.
The important thing to remember is that doing these frequent reviews is made possible by dramatically simplifying each review cycle. A manager can fill out Deloitte’s four questions in well under 5 minutes, which has made regular employee scoring feasible.
Reviews score, managers manage
The reason Deloitte has team leaders fill out quantitative feedback about their team is because the organization needs a way to score and differentiate employees across the organization. This data can then be used for promotion and compensation decisions.
Deloitte does not use their structured reviews as a way to force team leaders to manage their team. Effectively managing the team is left up to the manager.
More Inspiration
Deloitte is not the only organization going its own way. These days, most great organizations are thinking critically about performance management and coming up with innovative new solutions.
Here are a few more examples to help inspire your own strategy:
Google’s Performance Management Playbook: Inspiration for Your Organization
How Does Uber Do Performance Management?
How Does Amazon Do Performance Management
How Does GE Do Performance Management Today?
3 Approaches to Performance Management: Google, Betterment and IBM
How Does Facebook Do Performance Management?
Performance Management at Tesla: What We Know
How Regeneron Build their Performance Management System
How Does Asana Do Performance Management?
How Netflix Does Performance Management
And if you're ready to take the next step, check out our guide to creating your own modern performance management process.
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