Performance reviews are just employers controlling the narrative when employees are underpaid
Right?
If you underperform, brutal negotiations ensue … prove your value or the deal is off.
Buuut, if you’re overperforming, you get gold stickers and praise, and the possibility of a pay bump through a process controlled by the employer …
instead of you telling the employer that *they* have to prove their value or the deal is off.
Instead over performing then becomes the expectation.
In every case I’ve been involved with so far it boils down to arbitrary feelings with only a slight correlation to actual performance. You get a good score if they like you.
So, the system is simply you get a raise based on feelings. Why have the performance reviews? The performance system is used to backdate reasons for the a priori decision if required for legal reasons. It maintains the illusion that there’s something to be gained by working harder when that’s simply not true.
In such a system, you re-roll bosses until you get one that likes you. Job hop. Move around laterally inside a company. Be a social chameleon. It’s much more effective to just ask more women on a date (bosses in this analogy) than to keep trying with the same one because people don’t generally change their minds.
@henfredemars
@workreform @maegul It is really hard to objectively rate people. On an assembly line if you keep up with the line you are as good as everyone else, if you hold the line back are you worse or does the line need redesign? If you are an engineer it can be years before we discover how many mistakes you made. If you are a salesman did you miss your numbers because the economy is bad or because you are bad?