Why you should already be thinking about your next performance review.

Performance reviews are tricky business... you know the type.. "do I cut the green wire or the red wire?" kind of stuff. It's easy to get it wrong and maybe easier to have it blow up in your face. But when leaders realize the impact these meetings have, they can put in effort year round to ensure a successful delivery.

I won't focus on the performance reviews where you got more than you expected. Because let's face it, we don't usually pick apart a review unless we're unhappy with the outcome itself. we didn't get the rating we thought we would, the bonus or raise wasn't what we had hoped for, or now we have to build a personal performance plan to improve over the next 6 months.

When a leader has to deliver any of these messages through a poor review it can be like attempting to defuse a bomb, or perform a risky surgery (neither of which I know anything about). There's a small margin for success and if you haven't done the work leading up to the delivery, a negative outcome will likely drive that employee further away acceptable performance or even worse they could turn negative and start to distract your team.

Here's some rules for getting it done right. (performance reviews, not defusing bombs or risky surgery)

1) Don't let the performance review be the first time you're talking about performance.

• You'll have a hard time successfully delivering an underperforming review if you aren't familiar with and using the language of the review in your everyday coaching. For the uninvolved, coasting, self centered leader, this formal review is the only time they'll be providing any sense of direct feedback. If the day to day coaching, communication and accountability are absent outside of the two times a year you delivery reviews, then the ONLY option for a successful reception of a review is for it to hold stellar marks.  

2) Be prepared with specific examples

• In addition to socializing the language and meaning of the evaluation criteria consistently across your team, strong leaders will be making notes in the form of follow up to support performance ratings throughout the performance period. This ensures there is a record of communication and awareness of strengths and opportunities and lends to much less debate on delivery day. Of course these notes should be discussed with the employee (so they can improve/continue the behavior) and should include positive feedback as well as constructive criticisms. 

3) Get serious about your team's performance

• Performance reviews are huge for the individuals on your team. Their performance as a whole is a direct reflection of your leadership. Individual performance evaluations should be top of mind year round as you work with, communicate to, and support your team. Be realistic about how well you have provided tools for success. If you truly don't want your people to be surprised on delivery day, then don't surprise them with new information. You're a team, and teams communicate and work together. Even if you are the boss.

If you're the one being reviewed, you are trying to make sure the right wires are cut too. Here's some tips to make it easier on you:

1) Gain alignment long before your review is delivered

• You own as much of the process as your boss. He/She only documents it and (hopefully) provides coaching. As soon as you are collecting a check it would behoove you to get on the same page as your boss. Make sure you understand the objectives and criteria within the review. More importantly get very clear on the way your boss defines them and expects to see them executed. If you think "collaboration" means 'working with peers when asked' and your boss thinks it means 'actively seeking opportunities to partner with others'... Someone is going to be surprised on delivery day, and it will likely be you. 

2) Be prepared with specific examples

• Just like your boss, you should be keeping track of examples that match the criteria. If you have alignment, then you'll know if across time you demonstrated an attribute or ability more often than not. Armed with alignment and examples you are better prepared to accurately assess yourself and openly discuss any discrepancies in your evaluation. 

3) Don't take it personally...er, take it personally.  

• A performance review isn't an evaluation of you as a human being. It's not a measurement of your worth. It's an evaluation of how your performance (what you did) measures up against the expectations of (what they want you to do) your position. At the same time, look at it as an opportunity to learn and grow, don't just skip to the final rating and react. What elements of the review are accurate? How can you improve? What are the benefits of getting even better in certain areas? 

Finally, nobody does anything perfect all the time. I'd be as cautious about a leader who gives me straight A's as I would about a leader who has blindsided me with new information and a poor review.

No matter where you are in your career, reviews will come and go.When the reviews are said and done, ask yourself "Will I grow more thinking I have more to work on, or nothing left to learn?"

What I learned from the hardest times in my life...

Sometimes in life there are those people you look at and wonder how they got to be so lucky. They seem to have it all. Big houses, nice cars, exotic summer vacations, beautiful families and the latest fashions. The world appears to be at their footstool.

This does NOT describe my life.

There are also those who we see and we think, "I don't know how it could get any worse for them." For these people, life appears to be much harder. Things don't seem to go right and it just seems that as soon as they are starting to get their footing, they tumble back down. In these circumstances it's easy to think, at least early on, "things like this aren't supposed to happen to me!"

This was my life.

I remember the first time I experienced the thought, "things like this aren't supposed to happen to me!".

My parents were in the process of getting divorced and my parents were separated. My Dad was staying with a neighbor while they figured things out. I remember one day looking out my window and seeing my Dad shoveling our neighbors snow. He stopped, rested his elbow on the top of the shovel and looked up longingly at our house. Maybe he saw his confused son in the window, maybe he didn't. But that was the first time I realized they weren't going to live together again. As I came to this realization, I thought "things like this aren't supposed to happen to me!"

I had the same thought several years later when I lost my Mom to her third bout with breast cancer. I was 16, she had fought for more than a year with shunts, chemo, radiation and a spreading cancer that made her bones so brittle she broke her femur rolling over in bed. Again, this time as a 16 year old, I sat and thought "things like this aren't supposed to happen to me!".

The familiar feeling returned later that year I sat in front of the principle of my high school and was told I was being kicked out of school indefinitely for misconduct. No other school within a 40 mile radius would let me in. This wasn't great news for my probation officer OR the judge I already had a court date with. Again, I surveyed the situation and thought "things like this aren't supposed to happen to me!".

In September of 2010, just 3 days before the due date of our first child, we went to the hospital when my wife hadn't felt our son kick in several hours. Once we were hooked up to the ultrasound machine, one nurse turned to two, and then four and then six, and eventually we were left alone. In a dark room and sitting next to a silent ultrasound machine, we held each other and through our tears we thought, "things like this aren't supposed to happen to us."

My story isn't special.

I don't write any of this to solicit sympathy or pity on my behalf. In contrast, I've learned that my story isn't special and many others have experienced tragedies and hardships equal to or greater than my own. What I have learned is these circumstances cause significant grooves in our life's path, and where they lead is totally up to us. Truly, it's not what we experience but how we respond to it that yields our return. It's one thing to experience hard times, it is entirely another thing to grow from them. Through my experiences and incredible leaders around me, I learned I was thinking the wrong way. Instead of thinking "things like this aren't supposed to happen to me!" I started thinking "What can this experience teach me, and how can I use it to help others?" This has made all the difference.


Life's challenging moments (and everyone has them) can plant and nurture the seeds of determination, persistence, toughness, and fortitude. When we cultivate these seeds by facing our fears, tackling hard things, seeking out new challenges, and most importantly, helping others to do the same... we develop Leadership Grit.





Photo Credit: Kristen Self Photography