• The Wall Street Journal , Monday, October 20, 2008 11 AM

It's one of those days when dreary metrics seem to dominate the business pages, as if American business has retreated to the foxholes of balancing spreadsheets from the frontlines of moving product. Or maybe everybody's metaphysically hung-over from the ANA convention, covered here by our bright-eyed bloggers, Nina Lentini and Karl Greenberg.

The Journal reports that if General Motors and Chrysler merge, more than half of Chrysler's 66,000 employees in Michigan could lose their jobs. Thousands more from GM would also be jettisoned. Circuit City may close more than 150 stores; Yahoo is planning major cost cuts including layoffs;  and the Journal's advertising column informs us that marketing budgets are being trimmed in Asia, too.

Perhaps the most surprising news in the Journal today comes in a guest column by a professor at UCLA Anderson School of Management, who tells us something that we all may intuitively know but dare not say: Employee performance reviews suck.

Samuel Culbert writes that the "one-side-accountable, boss-administered review is little more than a dysfunctional pretense. It's a negative to corporate performance, an obstacle to straight-talk relationships, and a prime cause of low morale at work. Even the mere knowledge that such an event will take place damages daily communications and teamwork."

Sounds like the only thing worse might be the employee separation chat .

Read the whole story at The Wall Street Journal »