Performance reviews

NealRomeoGolf

NealRomeoGolf

Final Approach
Joined
Apr 12, 2016
Messages
5,640
Location
Illinois
Display Name
NRG
I am trying to write my performance review for the year. It is painful to me to try to write about how awesome I am.

Do professional pilots have to do performance reviews? If the answer is no, it may be the best reason to quit my desk job and go join the ranks. ;)

Pilots do line checks (is that what it is called?) and have to do recurrent training. But do they have to write reviews of their awesome piloting skills?
 
I never had to write a review on myself. Just Part 135 check rides and rides in the sim.
 
My previous employer had us write our own reviews. Personally, I liked this approach. I kept an electronic folder with all of my accomplishments achieved throughout the year. When review time came around, it was very easy to transfer the information to the review form. I preferred this approach because there is no way my supervisor would be able to remember all of the wonderful things I had done throughout the year.

One year I listed world peace, a cure for cancer, and cold fusion as accomplishments just to see if anyone actually read it.
 
There aren't many things I dislike about my job. But reviews/goal setting is one thing I really, really dislike. Really.
 
Gerhardt said:
There aren't many things I dislike about my job. But reviews/goal setting is one thing I really, really dislike. Really.
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Yup. There are professions/jobs where goal setting may make sense. Accounting is rarely one of them. My goal is to make sure things are accounted for properly, in accordance with GAAP. It's an intrinsic goal for all accountants, so no point in re-stating it each year. We may have a few special projects to get accomplished, but generally it's just typical financial house cleaning or simplification of processes.
 
SoonerAviator said:
Yup. There are professions/jobs where goal setting may make sense. Accounting is rarely one of them. My goal is to make sure things are accounted for properly, in accordance with GAAP. It's an annual goal, so no point in re-stating it each year. We may have a few special projects to get accomplished, but generally it's just typical financial house cleaning or simplification of processes.
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Didn't realize you were a fellow accountant. My goals are becoming more people oriented as I climb the ladder. I tend to add goals throughout the year as unexpected things get accomplished. We don't keep our goals set in stone for the whole year.
 
Morgan3820 said:
I never understood the idea of writing my own review.
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It's because most managers are lazy and don't document discussions and accomplishments for their staff (if they even have discussions) sothey need you to do a self-review so they can write your review.

I always make this optional as some people like tooting their own horn, but rarely do I use any of it.
 
@NealRomeoGolf - Are you noting your opinions of how you did against the performance goals you set/agreed to last year? In that case it is very useful to compare your self assessment against the views of your managers. That's called Performance Management. The problem is that the goal setting process gets passed over (often) and then the end of the year comes up and someone has an empty file and no way to judge anything.

If you have no agreed goals for 2018 you should detail any "extra stuff" you did to save the day while still performing your "normal duties." Things like working on off time, finishing assignments early, reducing costs in some way.

But I wholly agree with you, it's a nightmare to make something up without goals and metrics.
 
I usually take notes about each flight. If anything happens and a passenger gets scared, I'll be able to refresh my memory on the details if questioned about it later.

Years ago I was "Pilot of the Year" in a company I flew for. And then fired a few months later..... :lol::lol:
 
Annual reviews are a waste of time. Rarely do they evolve beyond an exercise in using a thesaurus. The truth is reviews should be done when warranted, not by any timeline. If an employee does well, recognize it now. If an employee does bad, recognize it now. There is no gain in waiting for an end of year review. Unfortunately many employers, including mine, still put too much faith in them.
 
NealRomeoGolf said:
Didn't realize you were a fellow accountant. My goals are becoming more people oriented as I climb the ladder. I tend to add goals throughout the year as unexpected things get accomplished. We don't keep our goals set in stone for the whole year.
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Absolutely agree. The goals for my position are more "as the need arises". I can usually find one major project for each of my accountants to accomplish during the year, but we typically like to have at least 3 functional goals and a couple of "developmental" goals. When I write my own review, it comes out looking like a fluffed-up resume! However, that's how my boss likes it and he's never been too stingy with raises/promotions for me so I don't mess with the formula.
 
NealRomeoGolf said:
Pilots do line checks (is that what it is called?) and have to do recurrent training. But do they have to write reviews of their awesome piloting skills?
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I've never had a pilot position review that involved piloting. It's all of the ancillary duties and playing well with others that's important to many employers, not pilot stuff.
 
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Morgan3820 said:
I never understood the idea of writing my own review.
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I am writing reviews on my employees right now. They write and submit their own review to me, I get inputs from their leads, their subordinates, their coworkers, and the cook in the company cafeteria. Using all that plus my own observations, I create the final composite review that tries to paint a complete picture of their performance over the year.

Yes, it's a PITA.
 
I have a word doc with my performance review... been using the same one for the past eight years.... one of these days management may wake up and realize something is "a foot" until then I will just be my awesome self...
 
Ventucky Red said:
I have a word doc with my performance review... been using the same one for the past eight years.... one of these days management may wake up and realize something is "a foot" until then I will just be my awesome self...
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I save the word file for each of my employee's that I am required to do. Most years it is a matter of rewording the sentences to at least make it look like something is changed. Most of my employees I've worked with for years, if not over a decade. They know exactly where they stand with me every day, which is part of the reason why we have worked together for so long. The annual review on paper is just a check marked in the box.
 
NealRomeoGolf said:
Do professional pilots have to do performance reviews? If the answer is no, it may be the best reason to quit my desk job and go join the ranks. ;)

Pilots do line checks (is that what it is called?) and have to do recurrent training. But do they have to write reviews of their awesome piloting skills?
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I did, but they didn't ask about your awesome piloting skills, since it was assumed that you were going to pass the checkrides.

As I remember, we had to answer questions that would be more relevant if we had an office job. It was stupid. Luckily our pay was not really determined by what we wrote on our reviews.
 
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Zeldman said:
I usually take notes about each flight. If anything happens and a passenger gets scared, I'll be able to refresh my memory on the details if questioned about it later.

Years ago I was "Pilot of the Year" in a company I flew for. And then fired a few months later..... :lol::lol:
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Yeah, I resemble the remark. I was given IP of the Quarter award for the entire Group, then proceeded to be chastised about my "attitude" and to "tone it down", the very same week. You can't make that ---t up. No administrative punishment or anything like that, but it was amusing to say the least. I've since written off the entire military leadership construct as one pointless example of Kabuki, and go about my day. Attitude which will ensure I'll never make it to O-6, but at least you won't catch me on my knees for a living....

And yes, in the military we essentially write our own yearly performance reviews. The promotion system is broken, and me piling on won't change a thing. Ask me how I know (read my first paragraph again for a hint).
 
If I were king for a day, I would abolish written performance reviews. It pretty well documented they were a response to the Title VII of the Civil Rights Act and since then, spawned more litigation than prevented. Plus, they just pizz people off to no end, and are generally not used for any good purpose.

My favorite in my last job was a VP of Engineering. At the time, we had a 1-5 rating system with 5 being the highest. He decided that there were at least a 100 points of difference between a “3 and a “4” so he began handing out scores like 3.83 or some such nonsense. Since I was the General Counsel, I thought I would inquire about the performance difference in an engineer that was rated a 3.80 vs. a 3.83. Needless to say it was a very lenghtly, circular conversation that ended up nowhere. But it was his rock solid belief that the difference was both meaningful and measurable. Told him good luck in his next jury trial.
 
I worked a place for a short time where each manager had to rate their employees as top 20%, bottom 20%, and middle 50%. The bad part was your employees had to fall within that distribution. They didn’t seem to understand that if we had someone that was bad we would get rid of them. Needless to say, in good groups some very high performing people were getting bottom 20% ratings. It wasn’t good for morale.
 
skier said:
I worked a place for a short time where each manager had to rate their employees as top 20%, bottom 20%, and middle 50%. The bad part was your employees had to fall within that distribution. They didn’t seem to understand that if we had someone that was bad we would get rid of them. Needless to say, in good groups some very high performing people were getting bottom 20% ratings. It wasn’t good for morale.
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That's a variant of the Jack Welch / GE approach. It'll work okay in a large organization for two or three years to weed out the bottom dwellers, but beyond that all it does is **** people off and wreck morale. Managers are often told to release anyone who stays in the bottom group for two or more consecutive years, so the managers just rotate people in and out of the bottom in order to keep them. It becomes less of a performance evaluation and more of "whose turn is it" to be in the barrel.
 
midwestpa24 said:
I save the word file for each of my employee's that I am required to do. Most years it is a matter of rewording the sentences to at least make it look like something is changed. Most of my employees I've worked with for years, if not over a decade. They know exactly where they stand with me every day, which is part of the reason why we have worked together for so long. The annual review on paper is just a check marked in the box.
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You solved half of your problem right there....
 
As a supervisor who did a lot of annual reviews, I thought the employee self review was helpful. Generally employees under estimated their own performance and left the review process with a better image of themselves as an employee vs a supervisor only review where they thought the supervisor was only gigging them. It made the improvement part of the review more acceptable to the employee.
 
Clip4 said:
As a supervisor who did a lot of annual reviews, I thought the employee self review was helpful. Generally employees under estimated their own performance and left the review process with a better image of themselves as an employee vs a supervisor only review where they thought the supervisor was only gigging them. It made the improvement part of the review more acceptable to the employee.
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Most of my jobs, my supervisor became a supervisor because he either had been there longer than anyone else, or he owned the company. Most had no actual management skill with which to conduct a review.
 
midwestpa24 said:
I don't follow. Could you elaborate?
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Keeping employees that long these days is hard... having someone stay with you that long means you are doing something right, you have weeded out the bad employees and have put together a good team... the yearly reviews as you noted should be a breeze to do.
 
The first time I was tasked to do performance reviews, I went to my then boss and he told me two things that have stuck with me (and I've passed on): 1) If I came to you tomorrow and told you to make a 10% reduction in force, do you know who you'd let go and do they know why? 2) Nothing on a written performance review should be a surprise.

I actually like them for a couple of reasons. It is a way to remind me of what the folks who work for me do well and remind them that I know it. Also, if they fill it out first and then I fill it out, it helps me find areas where maybe I haven't been communicating as clearly as I should. (If there's a disconnect between their view of their performance and mine.)

You, and the employees only get out of them what you put in...
 
Ventucky Red said:
Keeping employees that long these days is hard... having someone stay with you that long means you are doing something right, you have weeded out the bad employees and have put together a good team.
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It COULD mean that...or it could mean that you happen to be he only place to work where those people want to live, and your employee market is small enough that you have to (or feel you have to) put up with substandard employees.
 
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