Mack’s Strategic Intent
The time John Mack took over the leadership of Morgan Stanley the culture was riddled with tension and starting to affect the firm’s performance. The firm’s divisions operated independently and there was internal conflict between business units, with each focusing on their sole profit maximization & loss limitations. Concurrently, even as Morgan Stanley was expanding its operations globally, the firm’s performance dropped due to delayed decision making and bitter battles over resources. Morgan Stanley was lacking from strong divisional focus, lack of future leaders, and poor career development & haphazard performance evaluation which resulted in employee dissatisfaction with promotion procedures and compensation schemes.
John Mack’s vision and goal for the firm was to become a “one-firm firm”. Mack wanted to change the culture and values at Morgan Stanley, in order to attract and retain top talent. He recognized the fact that Morgan Stanley’s competitive advantage is its people, and was willing to implement changes in order to develop and retain their best employees. Along with Tom DeLong, the newly appointed Chief Development Officer, they started implementing a new 360o performance evaluation system which was critical to achieving their goal.
The new 360o performance evaluation system
The new performance evaluation system was critical to implementing the new culture and values in the firm as it brought in a new set of criteria & objectivity into the evaluation process, also helping to boost employee’s development and morale. The main goal was to enhance the professional development of personnel by providing greater objectivity and fairness on explicit criteria, increasing real-time feedback, cross-departmental teamwork, providing substantive annual performance appraisals, and identifying higher long-term professional