Behind the scenes

The classic appraisal interview is dead - long live the echo

7.12.2021

Translation: machine translated

From formulating a shared mission to goal setting and evaluation, our goal-setting and evaluation process at Galaxus centers on the team, not the individual. With swarm intelligence and the greatest possible transparency, we set out on new adventures year after year.

Every autumn, humpback whales make the 5000km journey from Antarctica through the Pacific to warmer waters in the South Pacific. In doing so, they cannot rely only on their sight or on any landmarks. They need more. They need trust. They need an echo. It's not so different with us humans. We are social beings - whether we like it or not. When we think, define and question together, we get more out of it. That's why we introduced the Echo process at Galaxus Germany and Digitec Galaxus in Switzerland: A collaborative and more agile update to the traditional goal setting and evaluation process.

Bigger doesn't have to mean more impersonal

Our company started in 2001 with a handful of employees and a single product focus: computers and related spare parts. Today, over 2,500 employees work in numerous categories for the four shops galaxus.ch, galaxus.de, galaxus.at and digitec.ch. They have come together from all seven seas. There is no blueprint for their success - online retailing is developing too dynamically for that. Over the years, new customer needs have been added again and again. Who would have thought 15 years ago that we would be able to pay with "crypto money" at our store today. Crazy world.

Where we used to be able to coordinate at short notice, the distances have now become greater, both in terms of space and content. In traditional large companies, such growth can sometimes lead to rather strict procedures. The annual appraisal interview is a good example of this: at the end of the year, the boss invites employees to his or her office with a serious expression on his or her face, where they talk about what was good or bad in the past year in a hermetically sealed room. This can be helpful, but often it is not really. Frustration instead of pleasure is the result for many colleagues who have to tackle another year without feedback. Echo takes a different approach. At its core is the conviction that an agile way of working is only possible if you proceed as collaboratively as possible.

Team Mission - Objective - Evaluation

For its own mission, each team condenses its own essence in a few sentences. There is no fixed timeline for this. Some teams disappear (once for a few days) into the mountains, throw away the keys to the chalet and fire off a document that they won't touch again for years. For other teams, the sentences are briefly collated during a coffee break and then steadily adjusted again.

The goal setting process follows. In descending order, annual and quarterly goals are formulated for the entire company, the departments, and finally by each team. In order to remain concrete, we limit the goals to a maximum of four. Important: All formulated goals are publicly visible for the entire company. This means, for example, that trainees can see exactly what the management has set itself. The teams act as the nucleus of this process. It is in them that the expertise lies and they are most strongly confronted with the consequences of their own actions through day-to-day business. And because new quarterly goals are defined every three months, the organization remains agile and can react quickly to changes.

The evaluation of the set goals happens continuously. Throughout the year, feedback or retrospective rounds take place within the teams.Monthly 1:1 discussions with the manager extend this feedback mix. A personal development discussion and corresponding development goals are openly available at any time throughout the year.

Employees then come to the new appraisal interview well prepared. They know what to expect. Instead of the year-end guillotine, there's a motivational talk with the team leader - with a view to the exciting tasks that await in the following 12 months. Winter goes by too fast and the next trip across the Pacific comes sooner than you think. The journey is the destination.

Would you like to join us in Krefeld or Hamburg and shake up e-commerce? Click here for the job vacancies.

1 person likes this article.

Andreas Schwarz

People & Organizational Developer

Andreas.Schwarz@digitecgalaxus.ch

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