Annual appraisal coming up? Shoot me now!

It’s that time again, preparation for the annual performance review starts to become front of mind. Endless form filling or online boxes to complete, thinking of the right words and phrases, facts & figures etc to try and justify a years work with the mindset of a promotion, or a pay rise, or not!

Across our specialist areas of HR, Marketing and Technology recruitment,  We have seen clearly that the top performing candidates, and likewise the businesses who retain their staff better than most, adopt a very different system of performance management.

From the candidates perspective, those who seek continual feedback on their performance throughout the year, bolstered by regular catch ups with their peers and line managers no doubt work far more effectively and efficiently as they have a much clearer vision of their purpose, their goals, and where they are trying to get to.

Likewise, Our clients whose culture embraces the regular catch up, who are clear about their vision and mission and where each member of their staff is clear on their role and business expectations of personal performance, irrespective of their job title,  are streets ahead by way of engaged employees and surprise surprise, their commercial performance tends to be very healthy.

Linkedin recently published a survey of the most common time for people to move jobs. Shock, horror, it’s that period between December and January. I’m not suggesting an appraisal system is the main protagonist here, but we speak to more candidates in December that any other time of year. Their main reason for thinking about a move? “My appraisal didn’t inspire me and it feels like I’ve come to the end of the road in my current role, I can’t see the scope moving forwards.”

What a great opportunity to change the status quo, to be different, to challenge the culture of an organisation and play your part in positively disrupting it which ever hat you wear internally.

I’d like Linkedin to publish the news that December to January is the period where the market sees more promotions than job changes!