????作為一位杰出的管理者，通用電氣公司(General Electric )CEO杰克?韋爾奇在鼎盛時期擁有至高無上的聲譽，就連微軟(Microsoft)、福特( Ford)和康菲(Conoco)這樣的業(yè)界大佬也爭相效仿他的管理政策，其中就包括一些員工注定會被評為失敗者的《幸存者》(Survivor)式評價體系。

????他推廣的這套“評級和封殺”體系(rank and yank)致使員工相互競爭，以避免被貼上失敗者的標簽。一些員工因為最終落在排名曲線的錯誤一邊而受到懲處，他們通常被排斥在績效加薪或獎金發(fā)放計劃之外，有些人甚至因此丟了飯碗。

????弗吉尼亞州喬治?梅森大學(xué)(George Mason University)管理學(xué)院管理學(xué)教授辛迪?帕克說：“只有其他所有人都被視為失敗者的情況下，才會有某一位員工能夠獲得高評級。”

????雖然公司績效管理專家不贊成這種“堆垛式”評估體系，但許多組織——包括律師事務(wù)所、咨詢公司、銀行，使用分級曲線的大學(xué)教授就更不必說了——都在使用非正式的堆垛式評價體系，比如根據(jù)員工向客戶收取的款項數(shù)目衡量員工的價值。

????但迫使管理者把員工分隔開來是一種“弊遠大于利的政策，”美國智睿咨詢有限公司(Development Dimensions International)總裁鮑勃?羅杰斯在其著作《實現(xiàn)績效管理的承諾》(Realizing the Promise of Performance Management)一書中這樣評價這種管理實踐。

????他總結(jié)說：“這種末位淘汰制往往會造成損害，同時導(dǎo)致人們的行為發(fā)生變化，但不是朝著好的方向。”

????早在21世紀初，一些公司就因強制式評級量表(改編自軍隊的“不上就出局”晉升政策

????)而遭遇麻煩。即便如此，依然有大量公司在全部或部分組織架構(gòu)中繼續(xù)沿用這項政策。其中最引人矚目者當屬微軟公司。但就在上周，曠日持久的批評浪潮終于迫使這家軟件巨頭低下了頭。許多有識之士認為，這種僵硬的評級方式往往會削弱員工的協(xié)作精神和創(chuàng)造力。

????根據(jù)科技新聞網(wǎng)站AllThingsD發(fā)布的一份報告，甚至就在微軟準備拋棄這種備受爭議的評估策略之際，處于困境的另一家科技巨頭雅虎公司(Yahoo)依然在采用。雖然雅虎并沒有確認這一點，但大量報道顯示，這家公司行事高調(diào)的掌門人瑪麗莎?梅耶爾正在依靠堆垛式評級模型篩除、解雇一些員工——這一評估方程式的“封殺”部分。

????早在21世紀初，就有人對韋爾奇的做法提出過質(zhì)疑。當時，固特異公司(Goodyear)和福特公司的員工率先發(fā)難。這兩家公司的員工聲稱，各自公司的排名體系帶有歧視性，他們之所以被篩除是因為年齡問題。2002年，福特公司支付1,050萬美元，終結(jié)了兩項集體訴訟案。這兩家公司后來都放棄了這套評價體系。

????微軟也與提起訴訟的員工達成了和解。這些員工聲稱，“以白人男性為主的”微軟管理層實施的強制排名體系引發(fā)了種族歧視問題。此外，康菲公司也選擇以庭外和解的方式解決了美國司法部提起的訴訟，后者指控這家位于休斯敦的石油公司使用了一種偏袒外國廉價工人、但不利于美國公民的評價體系。

????盡管通用電氣公司自身也惹上了與年齡和種族歧視有關(guān)的官司，但韋爾奇辯護稱，淘汰業(yè)績墊底的員工是必要的舉措；讓員工在步入很難變換工作的職業(yè)生涯中期之前離職，是一種更人性的做法。批評者則認為根本就不是那么回事。目前，許多公司正在穩(wěn)步放棄這套體系，轉(zhuǎn)而允許管理者以更廣泛的公司標準（而不是以他們在一個小區(qū)域或部門的同事作為基準）來衡量員工。

????In his heyday, General Electric CEO Jack Welch was such a renowned manager that other corporate giants like Microsoft, Ford, and Conoco rushed to mimic his policies, including Survivor-esque evaluations that guaranteed some workers would be graded as failures.

????The "rank and yank" system that he popularized results in workers being pitted against their peers to avoid being labeled as losers. Those workers who ended up on the wrong side of the ranking curve were penalized, usually by a denial of merit raises or bonuses, and sometimes by losing their job.

????"An employee could only get high ratings if everyone else fails," says Cindy Parker, a management professor at George Mason University School of Management in Virginia.

????While company performance experts frown on such "stacking" evaluations, plenty of organizations, including legal, consulting, and even banking -- not to mention college professors who use grading curves -- employ informal stacking systems, for example, by measuring employee value according to the dollar amounts they bill clients.

????But forcing managers to segregate their workers "does far more harm than good," says Bob Rogers, president of Development Dimensions International, the management development firm, who called out the practice in his book, Realizing the Promise of Performance Management.

????"It causes damage by filtering employees from the bottom, and causes changes in people's behavior, and not to the good," he concludes.

????As far back as the early 2000s, companies ran into trouble with the forced ratings scale, adapted from the military's up-and-out promotions model. Even so, a sizeable chunk of companies continue to use it in all or part of its structure. The most notable company was Microsoft (MSFT), which hung onto it until last week, finally bowing to long-standing criticism that such rigid employee ratings can cripple collaboration and creativity.

????Even as Microsoft was jettisoning the controversial appraisal practice, the beleaguered tech giant Yahoo (YHOO) was adopting it, according to a report from AllThingsD, a technology news site. Yahoo did not confirm its use, but reports indicate that its high-profile leader, Marissa Mayer, is relying on the stack ratings model to winnow out employees and fire them -- the "yank" part of the equation.

????Questions were raised about the Welch approach as far back as the early 2000s, when employees of Goodyear and Ford (F) challenged the rankings as discriminatory. Employees at both companies claimed they were singled out because of their age and, in 2002, Ford paid $10.5 million to settle two class actions suits. Both companies later dropped the evaluation system.

????Microsoft also settled lawsuits with employees who claimed the forced ratings led to racial discrimination by "predominantly white male" managers, and Conoco (COP) settled a lawsuit brought by the Justice Department that accused the Houston-based company of using the appraisals to favor cheaper foreign workers over U.S. Citizens.

????Although GE (GE) faced its own lawsuits alleging age and race discrimination, Welch has defended the grading, claiming it's necessary to weed out bottom performers and that it's kinder to eliminate employees before they hit the middle of their careers, when it is much tougher to change jobs. Critics feel otherwise and companies are steadily dropping the system, instead allowing managers to measure employees against broader company standards, not against their peers in a small section or division.