Job Reviews - let's see them

I'm in a position where every year I have to write job reviews. This entails evaluating about a dozen employees who all report directly to me. They are in different departments and some of the work they do on daily bases is shared with other departments but overall I'm in charge of hiring, firing, training, evaluating their annual performance and provide raises every year based on their evaluation/performance.

After doing this process for many years, I've narrowed down the evaluation form to three categories: "Overall Performance", "Above and Beyond accomplishments" and "Recommendation to enhance performance". In each section, I try to have a few short sentences.

Seems like the longer the employees work, doing same jobs and flying stable, it gets more and more difficult for me to place the actual verbiage and not duplicating the same lines I've used in the past.

Reason for this post is to see if there are others with the same situation and if anyone wants to use this post to share the one liners which can be borrowed, edited, rephrased to fit their own work place.

Here are some of my examples:

Overall performance:
*Accurate and proficient at keeping data logs for various projects.
A&B Accomplishments:
*Greatly improved time management skills over the past year.
Recommendation to enhance performance:
*Improve attention and accuracy to small details during data entry.

Let's see what you guys/gals have and if there is enough interest, I'll add more from my end as well!

HIJACK!!!

I've had subordinates I could have used these on:

"Since my last report, this employee has reached rock bottom and shows signs of starting to dig."
"His men would follow him anywhere, but only out of morbid curiosity."
"I would not allow this employee to breed."
"This Associate is really not so much of a has-been, but more of a definitely won't be."
"Works well when under constant supervision and cornered like a rat in a trap."
"When he opens his mouth, it seems that this is only to change whichever foot was previously in there."
"He would be out of his depth in a parking lot puddle."
"This young man has delusions of adequacy."
"He sets low personal standards and then consistently fails to achieve them."
"This employee should go far- and the sooner he starts, the better."
"This employee is depriving a village somewhere of an idiot."

Back to our regularly scheduled thread topic.

Sorry couldn't resist.

Now on a serious note:

"Proven ability to effectively manage independent work centers and supervise people"
"Adept in defining customer requirements and meeting their needs"

This is no dig at you but perhaps you might want to step away from the antiquated robotic language using overly used cookie cutter verbiage. Your employees will respect yo more if you put just a little effort into making the reports a bit more tailored to them. If an employee knows that you are paying close attention to there efforts, you are likely to get a better product for them. Happy workers is the key. I know you are busy, but give it a shot. Otherwise, the template old fashion reports usually get a quick glance by employees and then filed in the "R" bin.

I won't share any specific quotes but rather give you my experience. I have been a supervisor conducting what we call performance appraisals or evaluations for about 18 years. I have seen and even used the canned and "approved" phrases for highlighting an employees performance. While there is sometimes a place for standardized language I find a more personal and specific approach is better. It's harder but better. Employees appreciate the personal touch. Use the employee's name and be specific about a performance highlight. As an example from the OP's list...

Instead of... "Greatly improved time management skills over the past year", try... "John greatly improved his personal time management skills over the last year by effectively utilizing his day planner and prioritizing his daily tasks and weekly objectives. This improved time management has increased overall efficiency of the work unit."

bberg100 said:

HIJACK!!!


Sorry couldn't resist.

Click to expand...

You know, as I write them out, my mind so badly wants me to use the comments from your Hijack list it's not even funny!

Often I just want to write something like "If you would only pay as much attention to your work as you do to your cell phone (yes, I see you texting all day, you are not fooling anyone by covering it with a piece of paper) you'd be making double what you are now."

Shows mastery of matrix management.
Proactive team player.

61fatboy said:

This is no dig at you but perhaps you might want to step away from the antiquated robotic language using overly used cookie cutter verbiage.

Click to expand...

No offense taken, all good!

SteveWY said:

I have seen and even used the canned and "approved" phrases for highlighting an employees performance. While there is sometimes a place for standardized language I find a more personal and specific approach is better. It's harder but better. Employees appreciate the personal touch.

Click to expand...

I agree with both of your comments and would but time is the problem, or lack of and in the end of the day, all I need is a basic one sentence comment x 10, per review, which is then sent to my boss for an overall look, sometimes she provides comments which I then add, they read it, sign and date it, after that it gets filed in HR.

However, during every review, after the paper is signed, I provide a fully detailed verbal review, complementing them on finer details that I, as their direct boss, saw them perform and thank them for it. If there is a problem area which they did not correct during my random comments thru the year, I remind them of it during this time. I also listen to their problems, which are not always work related but may effect their work. It takes me about 10-15 minutes with each employee one on one, after that part is done, I go into the $$$ part of it, letting them know if and what they are getting.

Keep the comments coming!

I've had one gig in management. First year I was there, corporate HR sent a team down to tell us that employee evaluations should fit a bell curve. Two months later, I spent days reviewing my employees, then my boss called me in and told me my evaluations didn't fit the bell curve. I laughed in his face and told him I'd fill them all out to fit it if he was present when I reviewed the ones who were on the backside of the curve. He declined.

I am a little surprised that your HR department has not mandated a more uniform and robust review process rather than let you and other first line managers come up with your own criteria independently from each other. To avoid appearances of bias in the review process in case some people are fired for poor performance or no-longer-needed due to business changes in the future.

Before getting to the 3 categories you listed I might have expected an brief evaluation in more general areas such as teamwork, communication skills, job specific knowledge/expertise, (continuous) learning, customer engagement/knowledge, leadership, etc. Where not all these would apply or be evaluated for every person or every type of job, but a breakdown of skills to help provide more feedback to the employee and more visibility into the final review score or conclusion.

In parallel there would be some job specific areas that could be evaluated more directly. For example an insurance salesman might had have explicit job tasks like: 1) generate X dollars in premium revenue per quarter/year, 2) contact X new potential customers per quarter and document the results, 3) keep 90% of last years customers on the books for this year, etc. (I have no idea about the insurance industry, just trying to provide an example.)

Only after that arrive at the conclusion & summary where you give an "overall performance" evaluation along with positive feedback as needed. Alongside the areas of "need improvement" to give negative feedback in a constructive way. Regardless I think you should elaborate more on your feedback. Meaning "*Greatly improved time management skills over the past year." is a fine opening sentence, but should then give a few examples of where/how time management skills were improved so that message is more clear to the employee.

StillShaving said:

I am a little surprised that your HR department has not mandated a more uniform and robust review process rather than let you and other first line managers come up with your own criteria independently from each other.

Before getting to the 3 categories you listed I might have expected an brief evaluation in more general areas such as teamwork, communication skills, job specific knowledge/expertise, (continuous) learning, customer engagement/knowledge, leadership, etc.

Only after that arrive at the conclusion & summary where you give an "overall performance" evaluation along with positive feedback as needed. Alongside the areas of "need improvement" to give negative feedback in a constructive way. Regardless I think you should elaborate more on your feedback. Meaning "*Greatly improved time management skills over the past year." is a fine opening sentence, but should then give a few examples of where/how time management skills were improved so that message is more clear to the employee.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the feedback.

This company is small (about 60 employees) and runs a tight ship where there are more workers than managers and managers wear many hats. Time management is essential, hence why the paper reviews are kept to a minimum, elaborations of written summery is provided verbally with certain examples.

When something like "Maintains patience and calm attitude when faced with irate customers" is set, there is really no need to elaborate but when something like "Improve accuracy and attention to details during data entry" is there, then we would go into details and explain where specifically the deficiencies are noted and what can be done to improve them.

I've worked with 5 page evaluations in the past and they just sucked the life out of me so when we switched to a one page review, it gave me such much breathing room that I would never want to go back to it! If this was maybe a larger corp, then I can see how an in depth performance review would be more critical, especially in a multi tier growth ladder but with this small company there is no ladder, there is maybe a step every ten years when someone retires, leaves or is terminated, so the KISS formula works just fine in this environment!

bberg100 said:

HIJACK!!!

I've had subordinates I could have used these on:

"Since my last report, this employee has reached rock bottom and shows signs of starting to dig."
"His men would follow him anywhere, but only out of morbid curiosity."
"I would not allow this employee to breed."
"This Associate is really not so much of a has-been, but more of a definitely won't be."
"Works well when under constant supervision and cornered like a rat in a trap."
"When he opens his mouth, it seems that this is only to change whichever foot was previously in there."
"He would be out of his depth in a parking lot puddle."
"This young man has delusions of adequacy."
"He sets low personal standards and then consistently fails to achieve them."
"This employee should go far- and the sooner he starts, the better."
"This employee is depriving a village somewhere of an idiot."

Back to our regularly scheduled thread topic.

Sorry couldn't resist.

Click to expand...