Indra Nooyi

Those days, it was all paper and pen and, you know, pouring through wards of data.

You know, it's an evolving process, if you want to call it that.

Sometimes people deliver messages that are not heard because you haven't really delivered the message clearly.

People actually come out of performance appraisal and say, I think I'm doing a good job.

And you're going, oh my God, I hope that's not what you heard.

You're saying to yourself, because this person was supposed to have told you the three or four things, areas that you're supposed to improve upon and the three or four things that you did wrong.

You're supposed to have gotten very direct feedback.

People don't like conflict.

People don't like to deal with issues directly.

They like to beat around the bush and then leave saying, I think I gave the person the message.

I had the opposite perspective, which is give the message, do it in a supportive way, and make sure that whatever you tell them they have to work on, you help them get to that.

So I chose to write performance appraisals which said, this is what you've done well.

This is where I think you didn't do well.

This is what you need to work on.

And if you were to work on these issues and show progress, this is where you could go.

So you see what this letter did was celebrate them for what they did well, told them what they didn't do well, told them the three or four things they had to demonstrate progress on in the next year and how I was going to help them.

And then also told them, if you showed progress, this is your trajectory.

Because if we don't do it, I think we're not getting the best out of people.

Toughness, kindness, and clarity.

All three.