Forced ranking is a management tool used to measure employee performance. It gives each staff member a grade and ranking based on their performance compared with those of their peers or other team members. Most other performance management tools measure an employee against fixed standards such as KPIs or behaviors.
The forced ranking process uses three categories; A, B, and C. Each staff member will fit into one of these. A is for the employees who are thoroughly engaged and motivated, around 20% of staff. Those categorized as B are still performing but not as high as A and make up 70% of staff. Finally, employees in category C are underperforming, around 10%.
