How to Not Fear Your Next Performance Review

It’s that time of the year again. Your annual performance review is looming. Whether you’ve been through many before or it’s your very first one, we bet at least some jitters are starting to crawl in. Your review is a moment for both you and your manager to take stock of the year.

If you’ve been working hard, it’s the perfect occasion to ask for a raise or a promotion, or if you’ve been overwhelmed with tasks, it’s a chance to refocus your priorities and ask for the support you need. In this article, we explore what performance evaluations are, how to prepare for them, and sample written responses to negative performance reviews.

What Is an Annual Performance Review?

Companies traditionally perform a formal assessment of their employees once a year to analyze their work performance. This is usually carried out by your direct superior, who should provide feedback, pinpoint your strengths, and weaknesses, and establish expectations for the new year.

However, in modern workplaces, and especially in the smaller ones, the trend seems to be changing in favor of more frequent and casual feedback sessions. The so-called “manager check-ins” or “one-on-ones” are now held quarterly, monthly, or even weekly.

In any form they come, you should never be afraid of performance appraisals, as they are precious tools to help you grow professionally. If conducted properly they help you understand how you can improve your work, resolve any issues you’re experiencing, and have your achievements recognized and rewarded.

Types of Performance Appraisals

Performance reviews come in many shapes and forms, and every company adapts them to fit their needs best. However, there are three main types, which are sometimes also used alongside each other.

Self-Evaluation Performance Assessments

In many firms, you’re often called to submit your own review, before receiving one from your manager. This is a great opportunity to do some healthy self-critique, recognize your accomplishments, and set professional goals.

A self-evaluation is also critical to present all your results and highlight those that might not have been noticed. You’re basically building your case for raises, promotions or any other request.

Manager-Assessed Performance Evaluations

This is the most common sort of performance assessment you’ll run into. During a face-to-face or online meeting, you and your manager will likely first go through your current job description and update it in case your responsibilities have changed or increased.

Then, your superior will analyze and rate different aspects of your performance, such as your productivity, quality of work, reliability, communication, collaboration, or motivation. Finally, they’ll present advice on areas to improve, acknowledge your successes and decide with you what goals you should work towards during the following year.

360 Performance Reviews

A 360 review is based on professional feedback provided by a group. The group will be made of the people you collaborate with most. This could include your supervisor, colleagues in different departments, HR, and even clients. Not only will others be asked to comment on your performance, but you’ll also be required to review them as well.

In some cases, self-evaluation is included as well. This type of assessment is used to measure your impact on the company overall, beyond your specific position. By relying on a variety of inputs, you’re likely receive a more objective and detailed review than you would with a single person’s opinion.

How to Manage Performance Evaluation Nerves

Even if you’re 100% sure you’ve been consistently meeting your targets, the idea of a performance assessment can make you nervous. After all, who likes to be put on a stand and judged, right? This can be especially true when you’re waiting for your first review in a new company. Luckily, there are a few simple tips to get those nerves under control and arrive relaxed on your big day.

1. Embrace Feedback

Let’s establish something first: feedback is your best friend. If you are able not to take it personally, it’s a tremendous gate to growth. Think about it, in a review they tell you exactly what you could do better and if you have a good manager-mentor they’ll pretty much give you the steps for how to do that. Would you rather be stuck repeating the same mistakes without knowing it, or would you prefer to learn how to become even better at your chosen craft?

2. Get to Know the People You Work with

Even if you’re not the social butterfly type, try and connect with your boss and your colleagues to understand how they think, what they value most, and how they work. This will help you predict their expectations so you can hopefully better meet them and work together successfully.

3. Work Towards Your Annual Review All Year Round

Think about your annual review as a marathon rather than a sprint. Therefore, you should:

• ask for feedback often rather than just once a year
• regularly keep track of your accomplishments and struggles
• continuously learn and maintain your skillset to stay competitive

How to Prepare for Your Assessment

Not knowing what to expect is why so many of us are anxious about annual appraisals. If you didn’t plan for yours throughout the year, don’t worry, you’re not too late! When you receive an invite to your review meeting ask for details including if you need to prepare something specific. Regardless of the answer, be sure to always:

Performance Review Strengths and Weaknesses: Examples

Part of your performance review will discuss your strengths and weaknesses at work. Make sure that you have a good idea of what these are before you go in. For example, your strengths might be:

• problem-solving
• flexibility
• commitment to your projects

You might worry that presenting any weaknesses can make your manager look less favorably on you for progression. However, this is your opportunity to ask for support or training and set plans in place to help you improve. Weaknesses you could discuss include:

• difficulty with time management
• poor presentation skills
• difficultly delegating tasks

Performance Review Achievements: Examples

Always bring hard facts, specifically numbers, to support your claims. They are undeniable and prove that you’re result driven. This is especially important if you plan to ask for a raise or promotion. Check out our sample list of accomplishments for a performance review:

• leads you’ve secured
• transactions logged
• projects you’ve completed
• earnings generated or costs saved
• events you’ve coordinated
• clients you’ve recruited
• increased customer satisfaction or client engagement

Prepare Questions of Your Own

Your performance appraisal is the right time to get answers on any matter that is important to you. Make sure you engage proactively in your meeting and prepare a few questions for your manager.

Not sure what to ask? You could:

• Enquire if your boss has identified any particular strengths or weaknesses in addition to the ones you’re aware of. Often, it’s easier for others to spot those than for us.
• Ask what the most important challenge is for the company, and how your role can help meet objectives.
• Ask what growth opportunities they see for you within the company. You might find out something you didn’t imagine.

How to Deal with a Bad Performance Evaluation

You didn’t expect it, and it completely caught you off guard. You got a bad performance review. “Should I quit?” is now likely the question floating around in your mind. However, don’t rush to abandon ship just yet. Follow our suggestions on how to respectfully disagree with a performance review instead. Because, yes, you’re allowed to.

How to Comment on Your Performance Review : Examples

If you got your review in writing, don’t answer right away. Similarly, if the news landed on you during your face-to-face, buy some time to process your feelings. In both cases, perfectly acceptable answers to gracefully delay the conversation include:

• “I'm disappointed to hear my performance has not met expectations. Can I read [the review] more thoroughly and meet with you or get back to you later this week, before this becomes official?”
• “I want to make sure I understand your comments, do you have time for a one-to-one, please?”
• “I’d like to address the negative feedback I received. I would appreciate it if we could schedule a meeting to go through the points you mentioned.”

During your reflection time, make sure to:

1. Go through the criticism you received and try to understand where it came from.
2. Gather evidence on how you met your KPIs and any written communication showing you were succeeding at your job. This is critical to start building your rebuttal.
3. Seek additional feedback if you feel like your manager’s opinion doesn’t match that of the other people you work with the most. Perhaps your boss is not aware of all the responsibilities you’ve been assigned or fulfilled.

• At this point, you have the option to present all of this information through a conversation or as a formal written response. If your manager’s review depicts a misleading picture and you want to respectfully disagree with the performance appraisal, consider writing the following:

“Dear [manager’s name],

After reading your recent evaluation, I felt compelled to address the negative feedback about my performance. While I personally disagree with your judgment about my attitude to teamwork, I want to make sure I understand your point of view. With that objective in mind, can you share with me a specific example of when you think I could have supported the team better?

As you’re surely aware since [name] left her position, my workload increased considerably and I’m doing everything in my power to meet our team expectations. In light of the issues you raised, however, I’d like to discuss with you a possible revaluation of my current responsibilities.

Thank you.

[Your name]”

• If your manager raised good points that you didn’t consider before and you want to establish a plan to meet their expectations at the next review, you could write the following:

“Dear [manager’s Name],

I appreciate the evaluation I have recently received. I must acknowledge, however, that some of the insights you provided on my [XYZ] performance came as a surprise. As it’s important to me to keep working on this team, and I plan to fulfill the expectations of this role, I would be grateful if I could count on your further guidance. Particularly, do you have any resources or knowledge to share to help me fill the current gap? Moreover, from now on I’d appreciate more regular feedback sessions to make sure we are consistently on track with what is expected of me.

Thank you.

[Your name]”

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