Occupational Performance Reviews

[shazza]

Mine is coming up on Thursday. Do you be honest as possible? Is this objective based or do subjective feelings come into play? When they ask to analyse their performance, how honest do you get?

Sincerely,
Shannon Green

[Oslo]

Hi, what?

[Drago]

I always say what they want to hear.

[Lady Vulpix]

I don't get performance reviews. I have to go through contests every year (or 3 years if I'm lucky and get a regular position) to compete with others for my job and see if I can keep it.

[Dark-San]

Mine does peer evaluation. Your immediate superior will go around asking amongst your department to gather feedback about you. So your appraisal pretty much depends on your reputation and also your work performance. More of a 50-50 thingy for me.

[Bear]

they'll ask you to be honest, but I've found honesty rarely gets you anywhere if it's not all positive. Just tell them you enjoy the job and you want to strive to improve.

[Little_Pikachu]

We had our performance things a while ago, and honestly it was like they just picked numbers out of a hat for people, there was no logic to the scores they gave at all and everyone properly kicked off about it.

We were, of course, ignored because the management are right and you are wrong in all cases forever.

[mattbcl]

I have a performance review each year on the date of my original hire. My fifth one is coming up in a couple months. Typically they give a review which says flowery things and then says what I should improve on. The latter, which could be considered valid concrit by any other company, speaks more to the fact that my bosses hardly ever visit us in the field to evaluate our actual real-time performances and only look at our sales numbers and courtesy calls (visits to customers in which we rectify problems and make no money). We tend to call bull$#!t on these evaluations most of the time because compared to our own experiences of each other, they seem to be staggeringly inaccurate.

We were, of course, ignored because the management are right and you are wrong in all cases forever.

This.

[Magmar]

OMG I majored in this. What do you want to know about performance appraisals? I know EVERYTHING. Ask as many mundane questions as you deem necessary. I'll let you know if yours was done ethically or not. Seriously people, it's good to have an HR expert in your corner.

[Fett One]

Employee evaluations are held every September at my job. Your boss is given a form with a bunch of questions pertaining to your job. He/she has to check off excellent, satisfactory, or poor next to each question. At the bottom of the page is a box to write in any comments (comments are optional) they may have if they have things they want to say that go beyond answering the questions.

[Crystal Mew]

I just had mine like last month, and my manager (well...my dept manager) literally said "you can only say you agree or strongly agree, nothing NEGATIVE!!"

I was like 'what if I don't agree...?"

'too bad"

uh. yeah ok, I said what I wanted lol

the evaluations about me however are coming up in august sometime, hopefully I get a decent raise this year

[shazza]

Thanks everyone! The relationship between my boss and myself has been pretty shitty recently. A part of this is to do a self assessment and discuss their own managerial skills. I think it's safe to say I best not be overly negative and let subjective perception come into play here.

They are asking me to sign a contract. The past 6 months I have worked as a "contractor" despite being treated as an employee. This means I miss out on superannuation, sick leave etc. Fucking pisses me off but I've just been too scared returning to unemployment to mention it. I'm thinking of doing so in the meeting on Thursday. Only live once. Sigh.

[Gavin Luper]

Thanks everyone! The relationship between my boss and myself has been pretty shitty recently. A part of this is to do a self assessment and discuss their own managerial skills. I think it's safe to say I best not be overly negative and let subjective perception come into play here.

They are asking me to sign a contract. The past 6 months I have worked as a "contractor" despite being treated as an employee. This means I miss out on superannuation, sick leave etc. Fucking pisses me off but I've just been too scared returning to unemployment to mention it. I'm thinking of doing so in the meeting on Thursday. Only live once. Sigh.

In regards to the original question, I work in a bank and we have quarterly performance reviews, so I'm pretty accustomed to them by now.

I find constructive honesty is always the right approach. As long as you have the right attitude and are conscientious and diplomatic, you should have a successful review. If they say that you haven't achieved a particular outcome that you are supposed to in your role, acknowledge that this is true however you think this is partly due to perhaps a knowledge gap or a gap in your confidence to perform that function; suggest that this could be solved by perhaps further training or guidance that would help you be more successful in that regard going forward.

This is all based on bank work and bankspeak, though, so what holds true for me in my industry may not match up with yours, but if it helps, then I'm glad. At the end of the day what your boss wants is an employee with a good attitude who is performing well, so if you can demonstrate that you should be fine.

About the contract/full time thing, if you feel comfortable, why not raise it diplomatically during the meeting? Something like "I know I'm currently working on a contract basis, but what are my options in terms of joining the business on a permanent full-time basis in the future?" At least it will give you an indication, and it doesn't necessarily seem pushy in my view.

Anyway man, take or leave the advice, but I hope it helps - good luck with your performance review!

[shazza]

Thanks, Gav. I am already essentially full time. The only difference is I have an ABN so they avoid all the full time benefits. I'm extremely tempted to quit if this continues which I am certain it will.

[Gavin Luper]

Thanks, Gav. I am already essentially full time. The only difference is I have an ABN so they avoid all the full time benefits. I'm extremely tempted to quit if this continues which I am certain it will.

No worries. It might feel cathartic to quit but it would do you out of a job that you may well be able to retain and improve upon if you negotiate instead. Why not assertively explain that you understand why they are employing you as a contractor currently, but you are eventually hoping to a secure something that will give you the benefits of full-time work, and does that sound like an option they would be willing to help you pursue?

I don't mean to be pushy - it's your life obviously. Do what you wish and good luck!

[Magmar]

Okay, time to talk HR.

Performance appraisals should be done ethically and objectively. After all, the boss must keep in mind that these reviews directly impact his or her employees' lives for the next year. Your boss controls your salary, and merit raises are based on annual/quarterly performance.

Common errors include leniency (the tendency to diminish the impact of negative employee actions), recency (the tendency to consider employee behavior closer to the review than across the entire year), and halo/horn (the tendency to make invalid positive/negative (hence, halo vs. horn) assumptions about an employee based on your subjective interpretation/personal relationship with them).

Performance should never, ever, EVER be a rank system or based on anything but job-related tasks and behaviors and their impact on the company environment. Ranking systems are the worst because an employee will always be ranked "last" regardless of whether they are a good or poor-performing employee. Thus, each review should be completed objectively and not comparing your contributions to your peers'. It is you vs. company standards in a performance appraisal; nobody else is involved.

Your boss's job is to monitor and accurately document your performance over the course of the year. He or she should use a scale with no more than 5 possible rankings from worst to best. The scale should be obviously defined such that the employer will not misinterpret company guidelines. Look for these things to ensure fairness in your review.

[shazza]

Thanks, Barry. My wisdom is being throttled lately by anxiety so to understand in clear terms what should be expected of the procedure is helpful.

I think I'll do that, Gav. I don't understand at all why I'm a contractor except illegally to get out of paying tax and shorten costs. To be classed as a contractor for half a year, not having been asked to sign anything until now, and have my invoices generated by them is completely dodgy. Apparently I have a case with Fair Work if I wish to pursue a complaint.

The review is at 4 today. I was writing a few notes but it manifested into a thousand word introspective piece. I feel more comfortable with the written language anyway. I was late for work again for the third time, but this time was not a case of sleeping in rather taxi not coming. My boss Kent aware of that yet, however. Thanks!