Our performance management theme for the month of May is the use of an online performance management system.  Prior to implementing a performance management system, two things need to be addressed first.  Data related to who is supervising who, who is in which job position etc., must be clean.  Performance management log in information, assignment of goals and a number of other aspects will be impacted by this information.  Inaccurate or duplicate data will only result in problems and confusion.  The second point relates to your performance management processes.  As some say "automating a poor process only leads to a faster poor process".  Before selecting a system, it is important to understand what your requirements will be.  In order to accurately identify these requirements, the process needs to be established.  Work out any problems in the process prior to automation.  Not to say that you won't make some adjustments based upon your software selection, but this work must still be done upfront. 

When planning for performance management, a valuable resource is the book "The Performance Appraisal Book" by Amy Delpo.   You can read a review of the book here.

The book is now available free of charge from the Mindsolve website:  http://www.mindsolve.com/site/resources/performanceappraisals.aspx