Hating Our Rating

Every summer each employee in the company has to complete a Mid-Year Performance Review. This document compiles work related year-to-date accomplishments. After putting time and effort into the review, it is skimmed over by a respective manager, signed off on, and filed away with zero correlation to a raise or bonus.

Mid-year raises do happen but they are rare. If you are able to perform DNA sequencing while splitting atoms and solve the crisis in the Middle East (within the same six months) then you are eligible. At this point, your accomplishments are reviewed by the upper-echelon of the company and then filed away with zero correlation to a raise or bonus.

The real purpose of the review process is to ensure that your manager knows your still alive. Also, it helps you remember your accomplishments for the yearly review which has the same raise and bonus structure as the mid-year review. Not only is the mid-year process unnecessary, it's also ambiguous. Advice from superiors on writing the review ranges from, "Don't spend too much time on it" to "It's your accomplishments, make sure you spend some time on it". Clear as mud, wrapped in mud, deep-fried in mud. Surprisingly, I have little to write about for the past six months due to the fact that my job can be completed by a monkey in diapers.

I've had it with these performance reviews,
and my non-absorbent diapers.

Now it's time for self-reflection at the past six months. Pretty impressive stuff, I have managed to stay awake for almost every working day, shown up to work sober on Mondays and Tuesdays, and not scratch my car in the parking garage. Time to pat myself on the back. Here are some other expectations that I was able to meet and often exceed:

• Process improvement through technology. Through the use of data filters and several macros in Microsoft Excel, I was able to create a menu of area restaurants. Now with the click of a button I can search by price, cuisine, and mileage from the office. This has drastically reduced the amount of time my co-workers and I discuss where to eat for lunch.
• Ramp-up coding skills. Through the use of coding I created a random number generator. This random number generator is restricted to a range that is equal to the number of co-workers I go out to lunch with. Each number within the range corresponds to a specific co-worker. The number that is randomly chosen by my code decides which co-worker will drive to lunch.
• Enhance communication skills with the client. The client has relied less on my manager and more on me over the past six months. Due to this level of trust I have been able to communicate my priorities to them. Through effective communication, they understand that I am not to be disturbed from 11:45 to approximately 2:00pm. This time has been set aside to run my macro to decide where I am going to eat lunch, the random number generator to determine who will drive, and my actual lunch hour.

Wow, what a difference six months make. That's one of the wonderful components of my job. No matter how well you perform, you can always do better and strive for the next level. And my superiors have always been kind enough to remind me of this even when I perform outside the scope of my regular responsibilities. Here are some of the expected levels that I must perform at to reach the next stage of my career

• Synthesize findings. Sounds great if I knew what it was. Last time I synthesized anything was on my circa 1984 Casio keyboard trying to learn the Axel Foley theme from Beverly Hills Cop.
• Contribution alignment with client. A euphemism for "shutup and do what the client says".
• Actions with purpose. Prior to learning this, I was running around the office with just my boxers screaming, "the hurricane is near, everyone duck". A co-worker was kind enough to tell me that my actions had no purpose. With her advice, I've drastically reduced this action to only one time per week.

Job well done!

Do I get a raise?

No, but I'll continue shaking
your hand with a blank stare.

Enough of my complaining. It's time to get to the next level and be the difference! But first, I need to tell everyone that a hurricane is coming. Off with the pants and shirt. Maybe I'll even try commando this time.