Talking to a bunch of course participants about their upcoming annual reviews recently, I was struck yet again by how negatively many people feel about them. Sure, many people do look forward to their reviews, but a large number of others seem to approach them with emotions such as resignation, cynicism and even downright anxiety. My conversations with staff and managers across a range of industries and organisations suggests that there are diverse factors influencing this negative attitude to reviews depending on the specific organisation, including rising job insecurity and, in some workplaces, a poor motivational culture. From a communication perspective, however, three issues pop up regularly enough that I think they are worth considering whenever your staff (or you yourself) start anticipating upcoming reviews with trepidation.


1. Are people getting enough regular feedback?

Because formal feedback mechanisms exist, some managers and supervisors seem to think this lets them off the hook when it comes to providing informal, regular feedback to staff (and to each other). It doesn’t! Employees need regular feedback to be confident and secure that they are putting in the required effort towards the required goals. People starved of regular discussion about how they are performing lose direction, and are more likely to become insecure and unmotivated. Also, if staff are not getting regular feedback, the annual review becomes a much bigger deal than it should be. People working in a high-feedback culture will regard their annual review as a consolidation of the feedback they have been receiving throughout the year. Give your staff weekly, or even daily, reviews and they will be far less likely to regard the annual affair as an ordeal to be endured.

2. Do people know what they should have been doing all year?

Some organisations do not provide proper KPIs and many managers are not consistent at communicating focussed goals. The result of this is a large number of employees with no way of deciding for themselves how well they are doing on a daily or weekly basis, let alone assessing their performance across a whole year. In this context an annual review can be a terrifying prospect. People are aware that a review can have a major impact on their careers but have no real idea in advance whether they have impressed or disappointed. Coupled with the widespread practice of making the reviewee do the heavy lifting in terms of preparation and framing (“Could you complete this self-assessment before your review?”, “So, how do you think you’ve done this year?”) it’s no wonder that many do not look forward to them. It’s unfair to expect people to assess their performance if they are not given clear metrics to start with. If you are a manager or supervisor, make sure you are communicating clear instructions and measurable and goals. Reviewing the SMART goal-setting tool is a good place to start. If you work for a ‘vague’ manager or supervisor, use your questioning and active listening skills to elicit clearer goals.

3. Are people getting balanced feedback?

People like to feel appreciated, and for employees this involves more than simply keeping their job and receiving their pay packet. It also means receiving feedback that balances criticism with praise. However, managers tend to (understandably) focus on identifying and fixing stuff-ups, and can grow to regard competent performance as simply ‘normal service’ which is not worth commenting on (“After all, that’s what we pay them for!”). This means that most of the feedback that many people get is the negative, corrective kind, and they expect the annual review to be a once-yearly mega-dose of criticism. Managers and supervisors who balance criticism with regular praise and reinforcement will almost certainly find that their employees become much more relaxed about feedback in general and also more positive towards their annual reviews.


- Will Moore

Tags: feedback