Not to mention fairer on the employee. Not everyone is a self-starter or "rockstar". Failing to document clear responsibilities and goals and then measure perf

Not to mention fairer on the employee. Not everyone is a self-starter or "rockstar". Failing to document clear responsibilities and goals and then measure performance against those goals shortchanges you and them. This may be an unpopular sentiment around HN circles, but just expecting every employee to "get it" and not having a consistent process to deal with underperformance (which can have many different and often addressable causes) is a crappy way to treat employees in my view.