Writing a peer review is an important responsibility in the performance review process as it helps to ensure that evaluations are fair, balanced and based on multiple perspectives. However, there are circumstances where providing such a review would not be appropriate or effective and therefore in those cases declining to participate is the most ethical and professional decision.
Some of those key situations in which one should consider declining to write a peer review are the following:
- Conflict of interest: A peer review should be objective and unbiased. If there is any relationship or situation that could compromise that objectivity, for example if there is a close personal relationship or there has been a history of personal conflict.
- Limited collaboration or interaction: If the peer hasn’t worked closely enough with the individual to provide meaningful insights, the review may lack accuracy or substance.
- Lack of context or knowledge: On occasions, even if there has been interaction between the peers, there may not be the necessary understanding of their specific responsibilities, objectives, or performance metrics in order to perform an informed and fair review.
- Timing or process constraints: In those cases in which you are asked to provide feedback under unreasonable time pressure it is advisable to decline as the individual will not have enough time to provide quality feedback.
In conclusión, declining to write a peer review isn’t a sign of unwillingness, it is a responsible action when fairness, objectivity, or accuracy could be compromised.
How to decline a review?
A review can only be declined in case that it is a peer review, this means that it is not possible to decline to write a self review or a direct reports review. If a participant in a review process requires to decline a peer review the following steps should be taken:
⚠️This option will only appear if the manager nomination phase has been activated in the review.
- Access to my.nailted and click on the Reviews & Check-ins section.
- Access to the open review process and find the person whose review you want to decline.
- Click on the Three dots icon that appears next to the person’s name and select the Decline review option.
- Finally, click on the Confirm button to decline the review.
Once the review has been declined, the manager will receive a notification informing them that the review has been declined, prompting them to nominate a new peer to provide feedback.
Can the campaign administrator add a new peer?
While the manager nomination phase is active, the system will regularly prompt the manager to add a new peer if a review has been declined. However, the campaign administrator can always add new nominations at any time. To do so, the following steps need to be followed:
- Go to the Performance section and click on Reviews & Check-ins.
- Next, access the active campaign by clicking on its name.
- Search for the person’s review and click on the Arrow that appears next to their name. All the reviews being written about that person would appear.
- To add a new person, click on the + icon that appears at the bottom and select the name of the person that you want to provide feedback.
💡Make sure to revise that the selector has the option of Send peers questions enabled.
- Finally, click on the Send check-ins button that appears.
At this point, a notification will be sent to the peer or peers, inviting them to write that person’s review.