Member-only story
No-One Reads Your Performance Reviews
Except HR, but that’s only because it’s one of their SMART goals.
You might be right in thinking I have a low opinion of the whole performance review charade, sorry, cycle — especially if you’ve read any of my previous articles¹ about the various fun and games that are usually involved with this dire excuse for a useful process. And, of course, you’d be absolutely correct.
This nonsensical box ticking merry-go-ground that serves as a corporate gatekeeper to actually getting a pay rise does nothing for employee morale, motivation, or anything else apart from providing both HR and middle-management with a justifiable sink for their already well padded, and fictional, timesheets.
It’s not just that you have to define, write down, and attempt to hit a series of arbitrary “SMART” goals suggested by someone who most likely met you for the first time across a conference room table², but that those goals are by their very nature irrelevant, unobtainable, and even physically nauseating to look at.
What made me think about how many people actually read the nonsense written down as the result of a performance review was me personally reflecting, during my morning drenching at the whims of the Atlantic walk, on how many people actually read what I write down myself.
