Performance Scores, Productivity Metrics and Dismissal by Algorithm

All courses / AI Boss / Module 2 / Chapter 8

Learning objectives

After the lesson the participant can:

• Describe the three layers of a performance score and the kinds of work scores systematically miss.
• Compare the reported cases by what the system did and where the human stood.
• Explain the three channels by which a score moves from M2 Evaluation to M3 Consequence.
• Design a practice test that establishes from records whether an advisory score is decisive.

Key concepts

Three channels

The pay input, where the manager's assessment converges on the score because departing requires an explanation; the warning, a threshold notice that is dated, filed and later cited; and the list, where the bottom of a ranking becomes the shortlist.

Decisive in practice

A score classified as advisory that is followed in nearly every case, in seconds, with few recorded departures. If two or more alerts of the practice test fire, the use is treated as Level 3 Bounded or above and suspended.

Five conditions for an advisory score

The manager forms a view before seeing the score; thresholds trigger a conversation, not a sanction; the score is never the sole ground; the worker sees what the manager sees; and departures are expected and recorded.

Seeded cases

Test cases agreed with the representatives in which the score misreads the work, such as approved leave counted as low activity; at least three per unit per year, removed before any real decision.

Recorded exclusion

A use of AI that an organisation has decided against and written into the profile, such as discipline or dismissal. A recorded exclusion can be audited, whereas an absence can quietly be filled.

Interactive exercises

Do them here and get feedback at once. Choose a card and then where it belongs, or drag it.

Teaching plan

Discussion

1. At Xsolla a named executive took the decision but the analysis chose the people. Does a named decider satisfy the book's rule in that case, and what is missing?
2. The chapter says a manager's assessment converges on the score because departing requires an explanation and following does not. How could an organisation reverse that asymmetry?
3. Neither organisation uses AI in discipline or dismissal, and both record that as a decision. What is gained by recording something an organisation does not do?

Written exercise

Self-test

Choose an answer to see whether it is right, or open the answer below each question.

1. What did the review of CNT-HM-0001 find in Hansa Mutual's Dutch sales unit?

   1. The score had been used to select field-sales staff for redundancy in a restructuring, without the ondernemingsraad having been asked for its consent
   2. Managers had departed from the score band in half of all proposals without reasons
   3. 97 per cent of pay proposals matched the score band, with a median of 48 seconds from opening the score to recording the proposal
   4. The score was built on inferred emotions from recorded sales calls
   Show the answer

   C. 97 per cent of pay proposals matched the score band, with a median of 48 seconds from opening the score to recording the proposal
   The profile said Level 0 Advisory for M3 Consequence, yet the figures showed the score decisive in practice in one unit. The score was recalculated against the market baseline and the proposal re-made with the manager's own assessment first.

2. In SCHUFA, what did the Court of Justice hold about an automated score?

   1. It is itself automated decision-making where a third party draws strongly on it to establish, implement or terminate a contractual relationship
   2. It is always a preparatory act and falls outside Article 22 of the GDPR, provided that the party using it has recorded the score as advisory in its own procedures
   3. It may be used freely provided a person signs the final decision
   4. It is lawful only if it has been audited under the 4/5 rule
   Show the answer

   A. It is itself automated decision-making where a third party draws strongly on it to establish, implement or terminate a contractual relationship
   The Court reasoned that treating the score as a preparatory act would risk circumventing Article 22. The chapter concludes that labelling a score advisory does not settle the question; whether the decider draws strongly on it does.

3. According to the first of the chapter's five conditions, what must happen before a score is shown to a manager for an M3 Consequence use?

   1. The works council must approve the individual figure for each employee
   2. The supplier must certify that the score contains no errors
   3. The employee must sign a declaration accepting the score
   4. The manager records a short assessment of the work, forming a view first
   Show the answer

   D. The manager records a short assessment of the work, forming a view first
   The first condition is that the manager forms a view before seeing the score. It applies the series' conclusion that review must not start from the AI's answer.