What is a Performance Appraisal?

A performance appraisal is a review and discussion of an employee’s performance during a given time frame between the employee and his/her manager. The performance appraisal should be based on the core competencies of the specific role within the company that the employee holds. The appraisal should contain a rating of the employee’s competencies. The appraisal should also contain some sort of feedback from the manager as it relates to the employee’s competence in each specified area. Powerful performance appraisal phrases should be used when discussing the year’s performance.

The goal of a performance appraisal should be to enlighten the employee on their weaknesses or development opportunities, but should also be an opportunity for the manager to highlight accomplishments of the review period and goals for the upcoming review period. The manager should take the appropriate time to research key milestones that were achieved (or not) and provide as much constructive feedback to the employee as possible during the performance appraisal.

The performance appraisal process can be a valuable tool to the manager to sit down and discuss performance related topics, but in order to be effective you need to make sure that the expectations were set with the employee ideally before the review period started.  Nothing is worse than being rated poorly on a competency or objective that you had no idea you were responsible for.  Be clear with the employee before the review period starts, and check in with them periodically during the year as things happen.  It is also bad practice to wait until the formal performance appraisal to provide negative feedback.  If the employee is doing something poorly, telling them while it is happening is much better than waiting until the actual “written performance appraisal”.

Start the performance appraisal process with Setting Expectations: