I know there are bigger things in the world but I found myself having a full on hissy fit at work because of my upcoming professional development review.

I have to set the agenda using the self evaluation wheel: Professional actions in career long professional learning. Comparing levels on different tools (tools being particularly apt) each tool has slightly different headings and different numbers of them. Fffaaaaaaaarrrrrkkkkk!!!!!!!

What’s wrong with a professional discussion between adults.

So frustrated I was looking at career changes today.

All work is prostitution. Best get used to it.

I would ignore the agenda you have been given in its entirety. Discuss what you do, what value you add to the business, and where you want to head from here (assuming where you want to head isn’t straight to the bar after straight up murdering the asses of everyone in middle management).

This is the biggest single reason that I now work as a contractor. The ultimate example of companies that now apply management practices, rather than actually managing people.

My review consists of whether or not my contract is renewed, and I don’t have to get involved in this nonsense!

Helpful, I know…

and I don’t have to get involved in this nonsense!

Funnily enough that’s also the reason they prefer to employ you as a contractor.

PA in CLPL?
Are you a teacher in Scotland?

Mat has it.

Hmm – let him stay as a teacher. Otherwise the world is in a lot of explosive and incendiary trouble, and you’ll never catch him because he’s incredibly good at camoflague. 😉

Think you’ll find they’re energetic materials and its camouflage, concealment and deception. 🙂

Last pdr I had, I was asked what I had learned abounds my role in the past year.
I told my manager that I had learned that we were all guaranteed a seat on the B-Ark.
I didn’t get it, I sent him a link after that meeting. I’m in a much better job now where we don’t have that sort of stuff going on. We just talk to our boss.

Come on one of my CLPL courses for a slice of Professional Recognition towards your Professional Update, all based on the Standards for Full Recognition, Learning for Sustainability and all that…. 😉

Saw an article recently about big companies starring to do annual reviews in favour of continual and timely feedback rather than saving it up.

That is all.

Reviews and the names for it seem to wind people up if it’s not done right, the bigger problem tends to be actions not being followed.

This is the biggest single reason that I now work as a contractor. The ultimate example of companies that now apply management practices, rather than actually managing people.

The problem being a lot of managers can’t manage people. Giving them a structure to follow at least helps to get the process going. But if management don’t action on it then engagement will die off and the names/titles/process takes the hit.
In a group I worked in the process wasn’t really bothered with as the senior boss didn’t really bother and most of his staff were contractors so people were not engaged. My then boss told me that as his was pointless mine would be. I took great exception to that… it prompted me to do the work my side and challenge them to dispute my assessment. Taking ownership was a good thing and being made to honestly think about my strengths and weaknesses and having to justify it was very good.

So basically get involved, it’s what you make of it, know what you want from your career and come up with ways to do it.
To take a bit of a Thatcher quote – Don’t bring me problems, bring me solutions.

My line manager is one of the most junior of our management team. I had my PDR with him the other month (appraisal, review whatever you want to call it this week)

Turns out talking to some slightly higher up the food chain all the development I asked for, and was promised by him almost certainly won’t happen.

It’s a totally pointless system, particularly when your management team are flexing their muscles to try to prove who’s best..

(They’re all unless btw..)

I have to set the agenda using the self evaluation wheel: Professional actions in career long professional learning. Comparing levels on different tools (tools being particularly apt) each tool has slightly different headings and different numbers of them. Fffaaaaaaaarrrrrkkkkk!!!!!!!

Why don’t you just ask to be sent on a training course to use the self evaluation wheel? 🙂

This is the biggest single reason that I now work as a contractor.

Hell yeah. That and my gold helicopter, fleet of yachts and archipelago of caribbean islands.

I was never a fan of the whole meetings for the sake of meetings – formulated reviews BS, huge waste od time. Until I had a couple of staff who were under-performing and I wanted rid of them. Hard to do stuff By The HR Book, if there isn’t one. Hard to argue with months of overwhelming evidence, that not only did they underperform they had their hands held through the whole process and were given every possible chance to clean up their acts.

Yah de-humanising processes ! They are probably contractors now.

Annual review yesterday. Boss left shortly afterwards, spent the rest of the afternoon writing my CV.

Our annual review system is pants as well, worse still for me as I have to do reviews for 7 people as well, 6 of them I don’t work with so I have to go entirely on feedback received from others (who are all busy with their own reviews and 20 other requests for feedback). The whole system ends up in a 1-5 grade, generally getting a 3 is easy enough and it’s what’s required to get included in the pay review. To get a 2 requires loads of effort (more feedback, development plans etc.) and really just ends up getting you 0.2-0.5% more pay rise (a 1 is next to impossible), and as everyone has to fit into a fixed bell-curve distribution even if you do recommend someone as a 2 someone in higher management will likely review it down to a 3 as too many 2’s were put forward.
It takes all my willpower just to not say this is a complete waste of both our times when I’m doing the appraisal meetings.

We have a rather lax system here, I still haven’t completed any paperwork for 2015, so have no objectives yet. I intend to see if I can make it to the end of year without them. My Boss is equally lax and has never approved a single holiday application in several years, so I just go on holiday regardless. I quite like it like that….