Performance Review: What You Need to Know Beforehand
21 November 2012
Read by 2273 persons
Your performance review is coming up. Don't be stressed or doubtful. The meeting should be approached constructively, above all as a valuable moment in your professional life. For this, there's only one rule: prepare carefully.
A performance review is not an exam. It allows you to discuss your professional situation and review the past year with your direct manager. You will verify, adjust, and redefine a progress contract that you will mutually commit to. Based on these objectives, the performance review is part of medium-term human resource management. So that your work benefits even more the company, your team, and yourself. It is documented in writing and countersigned by both parties. So don't get the appointment wrong: performance measurement is done throughout the year, not just at this point in time.
Is it time to negotiate? "The main point is to comment on and confirm already recorded results, then to set new annual objectives and results to be achieved. Renegotiating your salary or trying to prove your qualities and skills at the last minute is generally not appropriate," emphasizes Didier Cabane, HR manager at ACIES Europe. It remains a privileged and formalized exchange to review your achievements, your skills and weaknesses, express your training needs, discuss your professional development project, and build the elements of a coherent partnership.
But to be truly useful, this meeting must be carefully prepared. Many companies provide managers and their supervisors with a specific guide. The most important thing is to adopt a constructive approach: do your own assessment, project yourself into the future. A list of points to discuss can be helpful. Specify the activities you would like to be involved in, the skills you want to strengthen, the training you are considering... justifying these choices in relation to your professional project. You will be able to consolidate the relevance of your objectives by comparing them with your manager's point of view and obtaining their support. In this way, the performance review will live up to its promises.
"The performance review is not a catch-up session but a moment of exchange"
Didier Cabane, head of Antelias Consultants
What place should the performance review occupy in a company's human resource management?
At least once a year, the manager must take the time to consider the activity of each of their employees to address the substance of things together. Prior to this, it is a matter of carrying out real reflection and preparation work to take into account all the parameters: performance, environment, context... After reviewing the past year, we address the coming year, identify the objectives to be achieved, areas for progress, training needs, and development wishes. The performance review therefore plays a preponderant role in the company's human resource management. It is also a privileged moment where the hierarchy must express its recognition for the employee's professional contribution. But when dialogue exists on a daily basis, the conclusions of the interview are not a surprise.
What is its impact on remuneration?
Whether you were "good" or "bad" at the interview does not change the year's activity results. The performance at this interview and remuneration are therefore unrelated. Neither an exam nor a catch-up session, it is a moment of exchange from which you must benefit by taking stock: what is the purpose, the raison d'être of my mission? What does the organization expect from me? What is my contribution to collective success? To do this, you must rely on facts, not impressions. Both parties will gain clarity, consensus will be facilitated, and the exchange will be even more beneficial.
Tips on the performance review
Arrive well prepared...
On your year's performance:
Review your previous performance review report to recall the objectives that were set.
Review all your year's activity in the light of these objectives.
List in writing all the factual elements that contributed to achieving each of your objectives.
Do not fail to analyze the causes of any difficulties you may have encountered during the year.
For the coming year:
Identify projects you would like to participate in and the skills you can contribute.
Consider the training that would be useful for you to progress, particularly that relating to professional efficiency.
If you wish to progress within the company, prepare your arguments.
Objectives are not always set unilaterally by your manager, you can negotiate them or even propose them. List the objectives you would set yourself and the reasons for these choices.
Apec.fr
Posted online November 21, 2012.
A performance review is not an exam. It allows you to discuss your professional situation and review the past year with your direct manager. You will verify, adjust, and redefine a progress contract that you will mutually commit to. Based on these objectives, the performance review is part of medium-term human resource management. So that your work benefits even more the company, your team, and yourself. It is documented in writing and countersigned by both parties. So don't get the appointment wrong: performance measurement is done throughout the year, not just at this point in time.
Is it time to negotiate? "The main point is to comment on and confirm already recorded results, then to set new annual objectives and results to be achieved. Renegotiating your salary or trying to prove your qualities and skills at the last minute is generally not appropriate," emphasizes Didier Cabane, HR manager at ACIES Europe. It remains a privileged and formalized exchange to review your achievements, your skills and weaknesses, express your training needs, discuss your professional development project, and build the elements of a coherent partnership.
But to be truly useful, this meeting must be carefully prepared. Many companies provide managers and their supervisors with a specific guide. The most important thing is to adopt a constructive approach: do your own assessment, project yourself into the future. A list of points to discuss can be helpful. Specify the activities you would like to be involved in, the skills you want to strengthen, the training you are considering... justifying these choices in relation to your professional project. You will be able to consolidate the relevance of your objectives by comparing them with your manager's point of view and obtaining their support. In this way, the performance review will live up to its promises.
"The performance review is not a catch-up session but a moment of exchange"
Didier Cabane, head of Antelias Consultants
What place should the performance review occupy in a company's human resource management?
At least once a year, the manager must take the time to consider the activity of each of their employees to address the substance of things together. Prior to this, it is a matter of carrying out real reflection and preparation work to take into account all the parameters: performance, environment, context... After reviewing the past year, we address the coming year, identify the objectives to be achieved, areas for progress, training needs, and development wishes. The performance review therefore plays a preponderant role in the company's human resource management. It is also a privileged moment where the hierarchy must express its recognition for the employee's professional contribution. But when dialogue exists on a daily basis, the conclusions of the interview are not a surprise.
What is its impact on remuneration?
Whether you were "good" or "bad" at the interview does not change the year's activity results. The performance at this interview and remuneration are therefore unrelated. Neither an exam nor a catch-up session, it is a moment of exchange from which you must benefit by taking stock: what is the purpose, the raison d'être of my mission? What does the organization expect from me? What is my contribution to collective success? To do this, you must rely on facts, not impressions. Both parties will gain clarity, consensus will be facilitated, and the exchange will be even more beneficial.
Tips on the performance review
Arrive well prepared...
On your year's performance:
Review your previous performance review report to recall the objectives that were set.
Review all your year's activity in the light of these objectives.
List in writing all the factual elements that contributed to achieving each of your objectives.
Do not fail to analyze the causes of any difficulties you may have encountered during the year.
For the coming year:
Identify projects you would like to participate in and the skills you can contribute.
Consider the training that would be useful for you to progress, particularly that relating to professional efficiency.
If you wish to progress within the company, prepare your arguments.
Objectives are not always set unilaterally by your manager, you can negotiate them or even propose them. List the objectives you would set yourself and the reasons for these choices.
Apec.fr
Posted online November 21, 2012.
