My 2 cents.

Stack Ranking is designed to give companies a lever to exit poor performing employees, with the thought of making room for more new ones... new ones who won't statistically, be as bad as the ones that were let go.

Your manager is tasked with finding people they don't like and putting them on performance plans. And let's be honest, a performance plan is not to help you improve. It's to make your life miserable so you start shopping for a new job.

You haven't done anything they can outright fire you over, but they just don't like you. So HR gives them this lever to pull. And it's set up as a cautionary tale to others, "If you aren't good, you'll get cut... just like Joe!"

Anyway I'm torn on Stack Ranking. I mean, it does exactly what it'd designed to do. It helps cull a small percentage of the employees every year. But is it fair? Or done in a way that isn't totally subjective? Not in my experience. And have you ever met anyone who was on a performance plan, but got off and went on to be successful? I haven't. 25+ years in tech.

But you can't just outright fire people. Everyone would hate you, and I'm sure it's not legal in every state. So you slowly build your case, through Stack Ranking, and after a few months you can just say, "Gosh, Joe didn't work out... not my fault, he didn't follow the improvement plan HR set down for him."

There are always those people who just... look, your team will work better without them. Think of the annoying guy who always puts his boss in an awkward position with questions, or think about the guy who cooks fish in the microwave, or the guy who is just a little too into [fill in the subject] and won't shut up about it... Stack Ranking helps get rid of those people from your office.

As a manager, I've participated in this. I've benefited from this. But I don't see any value in hiding the fact that you Stack Rank, I think that's the real flaw in Blizzard's plan. They should make it public. Tell all the employees, "Guess what, we're going to get rid of 1 in 20 of you to make room for fresh blood."

Is it shitty? Meh, I guess. But also do you really think that there aren't at least 1 in 20 of your peers you wouldn't relish the opportunity to replace? Put another way, do you really think that if rolled a D20, and had a 1 that you wouldn't get a higher number if you re-rolled? I mean, the odds are in your favor. If the 13 was obnoxious enough, or constantly biked to work and left his stinky bike gear to dry in the break room... I'd be tempted to re-roll a 13 too. =P

So me personally... years ago, when I was working at a bigger company, I used Stack Ranking to get rid of some people who were overly political in the office. Like... I just put them on a performance plan, and it worked. Give them busy work, give them a bunch of self-evaluations to use, and micromanage them until they quit. I guess it was shady, but the end result was a positive thing for my my team -- at least I felt that at the time.

If you trust your manager, Stack Ranking isn't a bad thing. If you don't trust your manager... well let's just say you have bigger issues. And really, if you don't like your boss you should find a new job... before you get Stack Ranked! (=