Johnson County to shift department head reviews to a single fall cycle using Workday feedback tool

Johnson County’s Board of Supervisors discussed a plan to consolidate department head performance reviews into a single fall cycle and to use Workday’s feedback feature to gather bottom‑up input.

County staff said the change would move reviews that currently occur throughout the year into a concentrated period in October, with “five or six extra meetings all in a row” planned to accommodate presentations and evaluations. The board and human resources intend to ask department heads to present short annual progress reports and to use Workday’s feedback (often described in discussion as the former “3‑60” concept) to collect input from direct reports and other selected reviewers.

The change is intended to increase efficiency and comparability across departments, county staff said. Some technical constraints remain: supervisors are not configured in Workday for electronic approval routing, so HR will perform back‑end entry for the evaluations. Merit increases and other pay timelines (merit increases in January; cost‑of‑living adjustments in July) were cited as part of the timing considerations for the transition.

Supervisors voiced reservations about administering presentations and final evaluations on the same day. One supervisor said completing both a public presentation and an evaluation in a single sitting is “not realistic,” and multiple participants urged that full written reports be submitted in advance so reviewers have adequate time to read them. The board also confirmed that four department heads who report to other county boards or commissions — conservation, public health, veterans services and emergency management — will continue to be evaluated under their existing governance arrangements, not by the Board of Supervisors.

The board expects to finalize a template and schedule with HR in the months before the October rollout and acknowledged that the first year may require refinements. No formal vote or change to county code was taken at the meeting; staff described the discussion as an outline of the proposed process and asked for feedback.

The board office said it will provide a schedule and templates in advance of the fall cycle and will solicit further input from supervisors and affected department heads.