To identify the top 10% of its employees for a leadership development program, which performance appraisal method should an organization utilize?

The forced distribution method is particularly effective for identifying the top 10% of employees in a performance appraisal process. This method requires managers to categorize employees into predetermined performance distributions, such as a bell curve. By doing so, organizations can clearly delineate which employees fall into the top tier, or top 10%, based on their relative performance compared to their peers.

This approach provides a standardized way to evaluate employee performance, ensuring that only a specified percentage can be rated as high performers, thereby reinforcing a competitive culture and encouraging employees to excel. This element of differentiation is essential in identification for leadership roles, as it highlights those who not only meet but exceed performance expectations.

In contrast, other performance appraisal methods, such as the narrative essay or critical incident method, focus more on individual feedback or significant performance events and do not inherently facilitate comparative ranking against peers. The 360-degree feedback method, while comprehensive and valuable for holistic assessment, does not provide the clear-cut identification of high performers in the same manner as forced distribution. Therefore, for the specific goal of pinpointing the top 10% of employees, the forced distribution method is the most effective choice.