The Money Mustache Community
Learning, Sharing, and Teaching => Ask a Mustachian => Topic started by: mozar on May 17, 2015, 09:59:37 AM
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Hello,
I've had some bad experiences with performance reviews (employers blaming me for things that weren't my fault) so they make me really anxious. My current job is alright but I'm a contractor so my company that is doing the review has very little communication with the company that I work for day to day. Also the person reviewing my review is an in house recruiter, who knows virtually nothing about my field of accounting. And of course, being mustachian I really don't give a so and so about either of these companies and I'm terrible at writing BS. Also I have to use SMART goals.
Here are the questions:
Establish goals to improve your knowledge, skills and abilities and to attain your career objective. List your plans for achievement also. Pfft
At this point in your career, what do you consider your major personal and professional strengths to be? Poop
In what personal and professional areas do you believe you need improvement, and what can you do to facilitate and measure
improvement? Peepee
What is your long-term career objective (four years or more) within the firm? Hah!
Any suggestions on what I should write? I don't think my answers will work :-)
I also have to answer a self evaluation questionnaire. One of the questions is how much do I help them develop their business. They've never asked me to do that so what should I say? Another question is "do I find work for myself during slow times?" I've never understood that question. I do make up work and then the lead tells me not to do but she won't give me another task and then is upset I'm not doing work. Argh!
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Establish goals to improve your knowledge, skills and abilities and to attain your career objective. List your plans for achievement also.
Do you have any aspirations for a more interesting/challenging/lucrative position? This would be a good place to describe those.
At this point in your career, what do you consider your major personal and professional strengths to be?
Presumably you are good at some things. What are they?
In what personal and professional areas do you believe you need improvement, and what can you do to facilitate and measure improvement?
Pick some things typically associated with higher paying roles here.
What is your long-term career objective (four years or more) within the firm?
Is this with the contract firm or the firm where you are doing work?
I also have to answer a self evaluation questionnaire. One of the questions is how much do I help them develop their business. They've never asked me to do that so what should I say?
"Not Applicable" is acceptable if the question is indeed not applicable - is it?
Another question is "do I find work for myself during slow times?" I've never understood that question. I do make up work and then the lead tells me not to do but she won't give me another task and then is upset I'm not doing work. Argh!
If you answer "yes" you should have some "for example"s to support it.
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I can't help with what to write for this review cycle, but going forward it helps to write down your special 'above & beyond' project successes, process improvements, implemented solutions, continuing education throughout the year. That way you have examples to which to point when you need to come up with this junk next time.
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Your raise was probably determined when the last budget cycle was completed and your company negotiated your billing rate with the company you're assigned to. Nothing you write or don't write will have any affect on it, so don't stress out about it. All your company cares about is that they can keep cashing the check from your current assignment, so fill in some BS about how you use your spare time at the client to identify opportunities that would bring added value to the client, potentially increasing the billable hours awarded to your firm. As long as you have a semi-plausible blurb, the non-accountant reviewing your review will rubber stamp it.
As for the rest of the questions, tell them whatever BS they are expecting to hear.
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I wrote a long answer (http://workplace.stackexchange.com/a/10881/2322) about this subject about a year ago. Everything I wrote there applies to your situation, too.
I've had some bad experiences with performance reviews (employers blaming me for things that weren't my fault) so they make me really anxious. My current job is alright but I'm a contractor so my company that is doing the review has very little communication with the company that I work for day to day.
Also the person reviewing my review is an in house recruiter, who knows virtually nothing about my field of accounting. And of course, being mustachian I really don't give a so and so about either of these companies and I'm terrible at writing BS.
First, read this post about why visibility is important (http://workplace.stackexchange.com/a/11818/2322). Does it suck that working world works like this? Yup. But either play the game or accept that you will do worse than those that do. This translates to being undervalued or having things blamed on you unfairly.
Also I have to use SMART goals.
Here are the questions:
Establish goals to improve your knowledge, skills and abilities and to attain your career objective. List your plans for achievement also.
I will take X training by 8/1/15 to allow me to better perform <ect>. In addition, I will spend Y hours independently researching and learning about Z by 12/1/15.
(note that these are easily quantifiable and easily overachieved)
In what personal and professional areas do you believe you need improvement, and what can you do to facilitate and measure improvement?
I believe I need to be better at X. In order to accomplish this, I will increase my ability to do Y from A to Z by 12/31/15. I will accomplish this through B, C, and D actions [maybe insert dates here too].
What is your long-term career objective (four years or more) within the firm?
I would like to become an expert in X, potentially allowing me to become a Y. This will enable me to better impact our customers.
Any suggestions on what I should write? I don't think my answers will work :-)
As much as you enjoy complaining about this, writing goals which can be achieved is the easiest way to write yourself a golden performance review. If you have attainable goals in your performance goals then you can quantifiably meet or exceed expectations.
Those problems you had with perception? Those go away if you quantify your objectives. If you want to be an all-star try reading this post about knocking your goals out of the park (http://workplace.stackexchange.com/a/7078/2322) for a raise.
I also have to answer a self evaluation questionnaire. One of the questions is how much do I help them develop their business. They've never asked me to do that so what should I say? Another question is "do I find work for myself during slow times?" I've never understood that question. I do make up work and then the lead tells me not to do but she won't give me another task and then is upset I'm not doing work. Argh!
If you can't think of a single reason you develop your companies business I'd be pretty worried you'll stay employed. Obviously someone thinks you are furthering their business so they keep giving you a paycheck.... ;)
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Ok, I am taking notes. I always thought that developing business means finding new contracts, which I don't do. They have staff that do that fulltime.