It’s evaluation time! Needless to say, this is probably one of the least favorite announcements of the year for most transportation supervisors. Some will wait until the 11th hour to get it done, while others ignore it completely.

Realistically trying to capture an employee’s overall performance for the entire school year is not an easy task. To get the most out of the process, it takes planning, documentation, follow-through and a clear understanding of that process. A little more money would help, too!

Rick Lecker, transportation manager for Longview (Wash.) Public Schools, notes, “When I started in this position, I found that [the evaluation process] took eight hours of work for each driver.” By streamlining his process and focusing on poor-performing employees, he has considerably reduced the time requirements.

Even though the process can be time-consuming and not always positive, “drivers need and want the feedback,” Lecker says.

One of the purposes of the evaluation is to help a struggling employee become effective and efficient. It allows all employees to see themselves as useful, appreciated members of an important team. You have the opportunity to affirm the positive aspects of their job performance.

The process also gives you an opportunity to point out weaknesses while highlighting strengths, all in the same breath. Bottom line: It tells your employees that you truly care about them.

Kathy Houck, transportation coordinator for the Reynolds School District in Fairview, Ore., says that teamwork is a big factor. She says that a driver’s “willingness to do extra work and volunteer for fun projects that improve morale, help staff and students” applies to the driver’s overall performance evaluation.

“I feel that if you challenge your employees to improve, they will meet your expectations,” Houck adds. “I even challenge excellent employees to share their talents with other drivers.”

Is there any harm in ignoring evaluations? It’s not a federal law, but in most cases, it is a state requirement or at least a school board policy. A sound and reliable employee evaluation program goes hand-in-hand with a successful and effective transportation program.

In the event of disciplinary action, up to and including termination, it’s an absolute career saver. When the driver, union representative and/or his lawyer show up at the district office, one of the first “freedom of information” items they will ask for is all past evaluations. Your job is to make sure there is something relevant for them to look at. If you have no evaluation on file, you have no legal leg to stand on. Without solid, documented evidence, a disgruntled former employee will point to other perceived factors, such as discrimination based upon gender, age, religion or ethnicity.

A well-written evaluation is a supervisor’s best friend. Here are several time-honored tips and newer options to keep in mind.

1. Keep good records. Many supervisors rely on their memory to recall countless events associated with each of their employees. Good luck with that one!

The mantra of the professional administrator should be: “If it’s not written, it didn’t happen.” Many supervisors will make a note on a pad of paper.

An excellent form of documentation is e-mail. Love it or hate it, e-mail is here to stay. So why not make it work for you? Create an individual e-mail folder for each employee. Then take a moment to document the details associated with a particular noteworthy event. Send it and forget it. For example:

To: Supervisor Fm: Supervisor Subject: Jones – 10/18/05: Driver Steve Jones was 10 minutes late for route today. Reminded him of the check-in time and expectation. First occurrence — freebie. To: Supervisor Fm: Supervisor Subject: Smith + 10/19/05: Call from principal at high school. Great job with defusing a disruptive student on the bus this morning.

{+PAGEBREAK+} Keep in mind that, just like all other employee records, they are open for review. Avoid personal comments and any unrelated activities in your e-mails. Stick to the facts based upon personal observations and interactions with that employee.

2. Make expectations clear. You cannot expect an employee to perform at a level he is not aware of. That is why it is important to share your expectations early on. A great reference for expectations is the basic job description. Everything you could ever want to know about driving a school bus is right there. It is a clear, legal and accessible document.

3. Set goals. The goals you have for your drivers must make sense to them. They must also be clear and attainable. In some cases, a goal will reflect on a past poor performance. For example, if an employee has failed to properly fill out his time card on four occasions, make it a clear goal for him to always fill out his time card correctly. Goals should be written right into the evaluation, reviewed and understood completely.

4. Don’t forget the good things. Note special talents, skills and other capabilities that otherwise may have been overlooked. Drivers tend to brace themselves for the worst. Officially noting a positive attribute or event eases the pain of addressing a less-than-positive event.

5. Welcome feedback. As you gather around your desk and open up a new box of tissues, make sure your plan allows for that one-on-one interaction. Take good notes and allow them the opportunity to share their own thoughts about the department and their personal view of their work.

Most evaluations should have a space for “employee comments,” and employees should be encouraged to make use of this space. When it comes to poor performance, it is important to draw a line in the sand; however, if a driver can justifiably point out an error, fix it and forget it.

6. Avoid length-of-service bias. I start every evaluation with the phrase, “We can all improve.” And it is true, whether you are a new or veteran driver. We can all find ways to improve our job performance. While longevity has value and should be recognized and celebrated, honesty and consistency is always the priority when evaluating your employees.

7. Use human resources. The sooner you get evaluations into the hands of the human resources director, the better! It is appropriate to keep a confidential copy for your working file, but the original needs to be in the employee’s personnel file — not in the training files of the transportation department.

8. Compare attendance. The sensitive subject of attendance is always difficult to document. Drivers earn sick leave, and in some locations, they have the right to other leave provisions. In most cases, all time off is approved by the supervisor. How can the supervisor evaluate an employee’s attendance as unsatisfactory when it is the supervisor’s final decision?

Attendance is an evaluative criterion and an excellent way to recognize exceptionally loyal employees while reminding less-than-stellar folks of their need to improve in this area. An appropriate method to share such details is with an addendum to the evaluation, cleverly titled “Attendance Report.”

In a graph form, note the overall averages of the entire driver corps side-by-side with the individual employee’s graph (see sidebar). Any school bus driver will tell you that sick leave is a contractual provision. However, poor attendance does impact consistency and the safe transport of pupils.

9. No surprises. When employees come in to see you, they should have a good idea of what their evaluation is going to look like. All previous disciplinary actions for the current school year must be noted in the evaluations.

These notes should address any oral warnings, letters of reprimands and suspensions. When an issue is documented in an employee’s permanent record, it should not be a surprise at evaluation time.

{+PAGEBREAK+} 10. Request self-assessments. Asking for a self-assessment from your employees tells them that you value their input. A month prior to evaluations, create and distribute a form that gives employees an opportunity to share their view of their work. You may be surprised at what you missed.

11. Solicit input from others. It’s your responsibility — and your right — to seek every point of reference when researching an employee’s performance. As with the driver trainer’s ride-along/observations, you can rely on your approved evaluative staff to share, in a documented format, the good and bad of an employee’s performance. This anecdotal information or feedback can be folded into the employee’s final evaluation.

12. Comments must meet the criteria. Forms will vary in complexity, from a simple does not meet/meets/exceeds expectations to an extreme 20-point breakout system. I have found that the fewer criteria, the better. Make sure your rankings always correlate with your narrative. One of the supervisor pitfalls, and there are many, is pointing out a severe weakness and then noting that the employee “meets expectation.”

13. Plan for improvement. Your employee evaluation program should also include a “Plan of Improvement” section when necessary. This is a more detailed report that identifies specific areas of weakness. It should clearly highlight required actions to be taken by the driver to improve performance.

14. Avoid the weatherman factor. Weathermen can make 100 perfect forecasts consecutively. But when they miss that snowstorm on a Monday morning and you are out chaining those school buses, guess what sticks in your head? That one missed forecast.

Keep an ongoing “plus report” for all your drivers. A plus report is when you get a call from a happy parent, a card of thanks from a student or an e-mail from a principal pointing out the great job a driver is doing. Yes, the snow storm is unfortunate, and it also needs to be memorialized. But let us not forget to recognize those 100 perfect forecasts as well.

Author Lionel Pinn is the transportation supervisor for the Centralia/Chehalis Pupil Transportation Co-op in Centralia, Wash. He has been involved with the school bus industry since 1992. Contact him at lpinn@centralia.wednet.edu.

Attendance Report

Here is an example of an attendance report, as described above, for a given school year. Following the suggested scoring criteria below, this driver does not meet expectations.

Type ------------- Overall Average -------- Driver Smith
Sick -------------------- 8.50 hours ---------- 42.50 hours
Bereavement ------------- .25 hours ------------ .00 hours
Personal Days ----------- 4.50 hours ---------- 26.50 hours
Vacation ---------------- 3.50 hours ---------- 17.25 hours
Unpaid Leave ----------- 8.33 hours --------- 125.50 hours
Totals ----------------- 25.08 hours --------- 211.75 hours

Suggested scoring criteria
0-8 hours --------- Exceeds Expectations
8-50 hours -------- Meets Expectations
50 or more hours -- Does Not Meet Expectations