Ask HN: How does your company do performance reviews?
Share your company's performance review methods (or even link to your performance review forms), and your thoughts on them.
99 comments
My company uses quarterly reviews. Here are the metrics my company uses to review each developer:
1. We have an in-house developed tool that tracks git and mercurial commits and calculates the test coverage and code quality for each individual developer.
2. We use jira to track the number of points each developer burns (points are shared between developer, reviewer and QA). We also track the number of bugs each developer introduces because closing a bugfix is not possible without first assigning the developer who introduced the bug to the jira task.
3. We use peer reviews where each team member rates each other team member on a scale from 1 to 5 (3 being considered sufficient) on aspects like availability, communication, reliability and result orientation.
4. Team leaders offer subjective input on each team member.
Of course, many of the metrics will be skewed or won't reflect the reality, which is why the team lead has the right to make adjustments to the final mark.
This being said, one of my colleagues and friend was "forced" to quit the company because he scored really low on the jira burn rate metric. He was given a tremendously huge task which nobody cared to properly estimate and break into smaller tasks. As a result he spent 6 monts working on the equivalent of 2 weeks of estimation points. The management (including the team lead which is otherwise a great leader and an awesome person) didn't want to assume any blame for this.
1. We have an in-house developed tool that tracks git and mercurial commits and calculates the test coverage and code quality for each individual developer.
2. We use jira to track the number of points each developer burns (points are shared between developer, reviewer and QA). We also track the number of bugs each developer introduces because closing a bugfix is not possible without first assigning the developer who introduced the bug to the jira task.
3. We use peer reviews where each team member rates each other team member on a scale from 1 to 5 (3 being considered sufficient) on aspects like availability, communication, reliability and result orientation.
4. Team leaders offer subjective input on each team member.
Of course, many of the metrics will be skewed or won't reflect the reality, which is why the team lead has the right to make adjustments to the final mark.
This being said, one of my colleagues and friend was "forced" to quit the company because he scored really low on the jira burn rate metric. He was given a tremendously huge task which nobody cared to properly estimate and break into smaller tasks. As a result he spent 6 monts working on the equivalent of 2 weeks of estimation points. The management (including the team lead which is otherwise a great leader and an awesome person) didn't want to assume any blame for this.
That sounds like a terrible process. With that kind of process I wouldn't want to work there. It's a great example of how developers are treated as second class grunt workers.
That's a fundamental misunderstanding of the purpose and value of story points. I hope that comes up in retrospectives.
Aggregating them for an individual developer over a long enough period of time might work, but I wouldn't trust it without some statistical hypothesis testing backing the idea up.
But using them to evaluate productivity on a small scale violates the collaborative culture (people over processes) that agile is supposed to foster. I've also seen them misused by:
But, no, I've never heard of agile mistakes coming up in a performance evaluation or a 180 review for a manager.
Aggregating them for an individual developer over a long enough period of time might work, but I wouldn't trust it without some statistical hypothesis testing backing the idea up.
But using them to evaluate productivity on a small scale violates the collaborative culture (people over processes) that agile is supposed to foster. I've also seen them misused by:
* mapping them explicitly to hours or days
* thinking they are estimates of value produced instead of work required
* having project managers point and pull in things for developers
But, no, I've never heard of agile mistakes coming up in a performance evaluation or a 180 review for a manager.
"one of my colleagues and friend was "forced" to quit the company because he scored really low on the jira burn rate metric"
This sounds totally insane. I Cannot believe this happens in real world.
This sounds totally insane. I Cannot believe this happens in real world.
"[manager] didn't want to assume any blame for this"
This happens depressingly often.
"6 monts working on the equivalent of 2 weeks of estimation points"
It's really the fault of the manager for not changing something after the first 3 weeks of this.
This happens depressingly often.
"6 monts working on the equivalent of 2 weeks of estimation points"
It's really the fault of the manager for not changing something after the first 3 weeks of this.
This exact thing has happened to me before - you have to be strong enough to stand up for yourself and communicate the real problem or else, yeah, no one will want to take responsibility and it ALWAYS falls back on the dev team.
Sometimes it's tough to be that ass and say "hey, these weren't estimated properly PM!"...but if it's your job or theirs...
Sometimes it's tough to be that ass and say "hey, these weren't estimated properly PM!"...but if it's your job or theirs...
It sounds like justification for a decision made for less quantitative reasons.
Managers don't say, "So let's see who's the worst performer... it's Tom! Weird, he seems to be one of my best developers. Oh, well! The metrics say he's the worst. Off to fire Tom!"
Managers don't say, "So let's see who's the worst performer... it's Tom! Weird, he seems to be one of my best developers. Oh, well! The metrics say he's the worst. Off to fire Tom!"
You don't know many people who worked for Microsoft? They would let go the bottom 10% of their staff every year.
"Best to Worst Ranking" is the most toxic and destructive environments.
Manu Cornet famous organization chart is the best example of this. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e1/%22Org_c...
"Best to Worst Ranking" is the most toxic and destructive environments.
Manu Cornet famous organization chart is the best example of this. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e1/%22Org_c...
I was under the impression that those rankings were created through a series of let's-sort-everyone meetings rather a pedantic application of metrics.
Yes they are, you are right. My company does them too, somewhat.
If you have to let go 20% of your staff, how do you do it? You have to rank people...
If you have to let go 20% of your staff, how do you do it? You have to rank people...
It sounds like justification for a decision made for less quantitative reasons.
Not in general, but I'm sure there are some that might.
"successfully escaped" is probably more accurate than "forced to quit"
It does. I've worked at two places that implemented the first two items in one degree or another. One place my manager assigned me a project to automate the commit counter for each developer and wanted to implement a standard template for the commit message developers would be required to use and that could be used to identify the particular feature or project so that commits / dev / project could be measured.
Software development in the Bay Area and other tech hubs with similar (or aspiring to be similar) company profiles can be depressing.
Software development in the Bay Area and other tech hubs with similar (or aspiring to be similar) company profiles can be depressing.
>> The management (including the team lead which is otherwise a great leader and an awesome person) didn't want to assume any blame for this.
Not assuming any blame is a trait neither of a great leader or an awesome person. But given the hell hole of a review process, I am not surprised the company has most likely imposter great leaders!
Not assuming any blame is a trait neither of a great leader or an awesome person. But given the hell hole of a review process, I am not surprised the company has most likely imposter great leaders!
After reading points 1 and 2, I thought your post was satire. This sounds awful.
"He was given a tremendously huge task which nobody cared to properly estimate and break into smaller tasks."
This is why the person doing the work must be involved in the estimation process, that way they have ownership of the estimate and are personally accountable for it.
This is why the person doing the work must be involved in the estimation process, that way they have ownership of the estimate and are personally accountable for it.
Why do you still work at this place? Like, this sounds insane to me, especially your friend being fired over management being bad.
I don't think that is a useful way to measure developer productivity. GitLab offers contribution analytics to get a good overview https://gitlab.com/help/analytics/contribution_analytics.md We find it a useful tool to have a data driven conversation between a manager and a report. But it should not form the basis of the performance review. That is why everyone should report to exactly one manager who understands what they do.
The Gitlab performance review process is described on https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/people-operations/performa... (it is over 100 lines so I won't paste it here).
The Gitlab performance review process is described on https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/people-operations/performa... (it is over 100 lines so I won't paste it here).
May I ask the company name?
Would like to know also as I would never wish to work there.
"This being said" sounds like otherwise the metric works. I wonder how. The first two points do not seem right (measuring code commits! Punishing bugs, tracking the burn rate as the person's measure of progress!) The last two points are subjective, but the objectivity of the first two points is likely misleading. At the same time, because they are perceived as objective, they are likely to lead the overall measurement of progress. So the example you gave in the last paragraph (of people avoiding blame) does not sounds as an exception, more as a consequence of the choice of progress measurement tools and criteria.
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That last part happened to me at one point. Thankfully me and another colleague it happened to fought against it consistently until it managers stopped using it openly as a metric.
Is there an absolute minimum score, below which employees can assume to be under consideration for termination? Or is it purely a comparative measure?
Large company, performance is based almost entirely on feedback from peers and those you report to with check-ins every 6 months. Overall score from 1-5 with a 3 being "meets expectations" and the most common rating by far.
The problem is that the feedback from superiors seems to be weighted much higher so the peer feedback is almost useless so don't bother mentoring or helping someone get back in front of their tasking. This leads to a lot of I'm-working-so-hard theatrics instead of actually being efficient/effective and delivering product.
Combine this with "suggested targets" (quotas) for the number of people in each 1-5 bin, you end up with the usual stack ranking problem that getting on the shittiest project (and keeping it that way to ward off competition) and making it damn clear to your manager that they can't live without you is the best strategy.
The problem is that the feedback from superiors seems to be weighted much higher so the peer feedback is almost useless so don't bother mentoring or helping someone get back in front of their tasking. This leads to a lot of I'm-working-so-hard theatrics instead of actually being efficient/effective and delivering product.
Combine this with "suggested targets" (quotas) for the number of people in each 1-5 bin, you end up with the usual stack ranking problem that getting on the shittiest project (and keeping it that way to ward off competition) and making it damn clear to your manager that they can't live without you is the best strategy.
If there was a more balanced weighting between superiors, peers and subortinates ratings, do you think these negatives outcomes would be avoided?
I just started at a company that kind of use this system. My first impression is that it is a good system and the weighting seems fair. But I would like to be aware of any potential pitfalls with it (not just for me, but for the company also).
I just started at a company that kind of use this system. My first impression is that it is a good system and the weighting seems fair. But I would like to be aware of any potential pitfalls with it (not just for me, but for the company also).
>If there was a more balanced weighting between superiors, peers and subordinates ratings, do you think these negatives outcomes would be avoided?
Not really because the stack ranking would still turn everything into a knife fight. It might even be worse because people would blame their coworkers for getting another 3 rating instead of everyone being unified in our hatred for upper management and the performance system as a whole.
We recently had a big Pres/VP management shakeup and the new crew is supposedly looking into changing the performance reviews but who knows how far that'll go. But they did sort out our crazy hiring requirements almost immediately so fingers crossed that they'll set some more fires before things stabilize.
>But I would like to be aware of any potential pitfalls with it (not just for me, but for the company also).
My only tip is to find a project lead/manager who didn't drink the kool aid.
Not really because the stack ranking would still turn everything into a knife fight. It might even be worse because people would blame their coworkers for getting another 3 rating instead of everyone being unified in our hatred for upper management and the performance system as a whole.
We recently had a big Pres/VP management shakeup and the new crew is supposedly looking into changing the performance reviews but who knows how far that'll go. But they did sort out our crazy hiring requirements almost immediately so fingers crossed that they'll set some more fires before things stabilize.
>But I would like to be aware of any potential pitfalls with it (not just for me, but for the company also).
My only tip is to find a project lead/manager who didn't drink the kool aid.
Oh, so you work at Google.
Oh don't get me started.
Fairly big (>1000 devs) company. Performance reviews are twice a year.
In theory: before each cycle, an employee and a manager meet to discuss manager's expectations. If an employee "exceeds expectations" he or she gets a good rating. The rating is then approved and bonus and compensation is determined.
In practice: the rating is kind of determined by how employee's work contributed towards "important goals" of the company. This contributes to a deluge of half-assed work pushed into production just before the evaluation begins. Also it of course depends on performance of the other devs. The existence of the curve was never officially acknowledged but it is an open secret that it indeed exists.
The evaluation process is extremely opaque and shrouded in mystery. An employee (and his or her manager too) can never be certain that enough work was done for a particular rating as they are subject to correction at the highest levels of hierarchy (rumor has it that the CTO himself approves the final ratings of all developers above certain level). The process is also extremely long (easily exceeds 1.5 months) and taxing for line managers who have to defend their subordinates' ratings against cuts.
The meetings between an employee and a manager are very awkward. In theory the manager should discuss career prospects and deliver valuable feedback, but what is the point of delivering feedback on something that happened 5 months ago? Why would you wait for so long to do it? So everyone just goes through the motions during these meetings as quickly as possible.
The whole process is very inefficient. Frankly, it stinks. (Personally, I've fared fairly well so it is not an instance of sour grapes). My opinion it that the only reason it exists is because it provides the potential of almost authoritarian control and ample micromanagement opportunities.
I wonder, are my experience and feelings somehow special or is it a common thing in our industry?
Fairly big (>1000 devs) company. Performance reviews are twice a year.
In theory: before each cycle, an employee and a manager meet to discuss manager's expectations. If an employee "exceeds expectations" he or she gets a good rating. The rating is then approved and bonus and compensation is determined.
In practice: the rating is kind of determined by how employee's work contributed towards "important goals" of the company. This contributes to a deluge of half-assed work pushed into production just before the evaluation begins. Also it of course depends on performance of the other devs. The existence of the curve was never officially acknowledged but it is an open secret that it indeed exists.
The evaluation process is extremely opaque and shrouded in mystery. An employee (and his or her manager too) can never be certain that enough work was done for a particular rating as they are subject to correction at the highest levels of hierarchy (rumor has it that the CTO himself approves the final ratings of all developers above certain level). The process is also extremely long (easily exceeds 1.5 months) and taxing for line managers who have to defend their subordinates' ratings against cuts.
The meetings between an employee and a manager are very awkward. In theory the manager should discuss career prospects and deliver valuable feedback, but what is the point of delivering feedback on something that happened 5 months ago? Why would you wait for so long to do it? So everyone just goes through the motions during these meetings as quickly as possible.
The whole process is very inefficient. Frankly, it stinks. (Personally, I've fared fairly well so it is not an instance of sour grapes). My opinion it that the only reason it exists is because it provides the potential of almost authoritarian control and ample micromanagement opportunities.
I wonder, are my experience and feelings somehow special or is it a common thing in our industry?
Wow, this almost exactly like where I worked, except peer reviews were also there. People would put in little stuff like "he once made xyz mistake in coding" (on local machine mind you, not on staging and not at all on production). That would lead to the manager complaining about it 4 months after it happened and telling you your coding was not upto par.
Result : does not meet expectations
Promotions happened entirely on the visibility of your project. One team reported directly to the VP, so EVERYONE in the team got a raise/promotion. Among the rest, around 5 people were promoted. That team, for reference sake, had 7 people if I remember correctly.
Result : does not meet expectations
Promotions happened entirely on the visibility of your project. One team reported directly to the VP, so EVERYONE in the team got a raise/promotion. Among the rest, around 5 people were promoted. That team, for reference sake, had 7 people if I remember correctly.
Wow, I work in a big, non-software-focused, multinational company, in a mechanical engineer role. Your post describes our exact review process.
What more, it seems managers always set the expectation high, or vague, that way everyone always get 3/5 (meets expectations). By now I'm almost 100% convinced that there is an official HR guideline that they are not allowed to give higher than 3/5 overall rating.
What more, it seems managers always set the expectation high, or vague, that way everyone always get 3/5 (meets expectations). By now I'm almost 100% convinced that there is an official HR guideline that they are not allowed to give higher than 3/5 overall rating.
In my experience at huge companies, getting a 4 or a 5 is largely a paper-trail formality that managers bestow on people they are grooming for promotion. It's a political gift and a retention mechanism. Everyone else always gets a 3, whether they've been kicking ass or competently coasting.
Systems like these create strong disincentives to focus on job performance above and beyond a certain baseline, and strong incentives to focus on self-promotion, politics, and lobbying for sexy projects and allocations. Especially true when there is a forced curve or stack ranking involved. (Spoiler alert: there is almost always a curve, whether formally mandated by process, or informally expected by leadership.)
Systems like these create strong disincentives to focus on job performance above and beyond a certain baseline, and strong incentives to focus on self-promotion, politics, and lobbying for sexy projects and allocations. Especially true when there is a forced curve or stack ranking involved. (Spoiler alert: there is almost always a curve, whether formally mandated by process, or informally expected by leadership.)
"We only hire the best."
"You can't all get 5's!"
"You can't all get 5's!"
Medium sized company (just shy of 20 devs) plus a lot of sales and other roles. We don't have specific performance reviews, only 1on1s where it's more about identifying personal pain points and defining goals.
I think the lack of pressure is the reason why this company is the market leader in its niche, has very low fluctuation and a very high quality code base. I used to work in a sweat shop where we had to justify every 15 minutes spent (via time tracking) ... never. Again.
I think the lack of pressure is the reason why this company is the market leader in its niche, has very low fluctuation and a very high quality code base. I used to work in a sweat shop where we had to justify every 15 minutes spent (via time tracking) ... never. Again.
Do you get yearly merit raises? Cost of living?
Can't really tell as I have only been on the team for about a year now, but I have been told that you get raises if you ask for them and have enough arguments to justify a raise. What about costs of living? We're based in Zurich, CH.
Normally (maybe it isn't the norm) employers give a percentage raise annually or bi-annually for to accommodate for the "cost of living going up"
Inflation in Switzerland has been negative for the last two years. Most companies did mot apply any cost of living adjustment, but I know some that have reduced base salaries in accordance to inflation.
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I recently moved from a large (40k employees) company to a small one (600).
Performance reviews at the large company always involve a lot of paperwork, self reviews, and hoping that your manager gives you good feedback. Reviews are rated from 1-5 where 3 is the midpoint and is considered 'acceptable'. Tbh, I started as an intern there, and I can recall three or four times someone scored 4+ off the top of my head. Getting a 3 was so trivially easy it was almost insulting. Getting a 5 once required a lot of work outside of the office and usually meant you wouldn't be able to get it again the following cycle.
Most of these incentive systems are just focused around being the best personal brand manager anyway, because they incentivize employees to sign up for the shittiest projects and then make a lot of noise and throw around a lot of money and bullshit to make sure everyone knows that they're singlehandedly saving the company.
At the small company, we mostly do small one on ones, and you set some yearly goals for each fiscal year that you get evaluated against. There aren't any 'metrics' involved, and it seems mostly like it's aggregation of subjective reviews from superiors and coworkers. This approach seems to work well for everyone. We have a really technical developer who doesn't really do the social game (and he's remote) and he does excellent every year. I'm more of a mix (I like to communicate with endusers and so on) and I did well this year too.
Frankly, I think the biggest thing is just getting out of big corporate environments. They're tough for mental health, and they're tough to get ahead in.
Performance reviews at the large company always involve a lot of paperwork, self reviews, and hoping that your manager gives you good feedback. Reviews are rated from 1-5 where 3 is the midpoint and is considered 'acceptable'. Tbh, I started as an intern there, and I can recall three or four times someone scored 4+ off the top of my head. Getting a 3 was so trivially easy it was almost insulting. Getting a 5 once required a lot of work outside of the office and usually meant you wouldn't be able to get it again the following cycle.
Most of these incentive systems are just focused around being the best personal brand manager anyway, because they incentivize employees to sign up for the shittiest projects and then make a lot of noise and throw around a lot of money and bullshit to make sure everyone knows that they're singlehandedly saving the company.
At the small company, we mostly do small one on ones, and you set some yearly goals for each fiscal year that you get evaluated against. There aren't any 'metrics' involved, and it seems mostly like it's aggregation of subjective reviews from superiors and coworkers. This approach seems to work well for everyone. We have a really technical developer who doesn't really do the social game (and he's remote) and he does excellent every year. I'm more of a mix (I like to communicate with endusers and so on) and I did well this year too.
Frankly, I think the biggest thing is just getting out of big corporate environments. They're tough for mental health, and they're tough to get ahead in.
If you've performance reviews, then you also most likely have some kind of metric, and if you've a metric people will start to game it.
A colleague of mine always said: you get what you measure.
A colleague of mine always said: you get what you measure.
Management at my company really likes to use jira estimation points as a metric, which is why I always argue for more points and occasionally snatch low hanging fruits (overestimated simple tasks). I'm aware it's stupid, which is why I always point it out, but nobody seems to care. I was the "most productive employee of the year" last year and while I didn't cheat by any definition of the word, it certainly did affect my priorities.
This. In fact, at one of the last companies I was at, an agency of about 20, devs were grouped into small teams (1-5) to work on different projects. While we used Jira points - these internal teams had different measurements regarding point count.
When I brought it up to various PMs and execs, I got the same answer - "that's the way it's supposed to work."
And they used these point counts and burndowns to analyze performance of each dev in comparison with the rest of the team as a whole!
So if you estimated 1 point for your story, but some other dev estimated 5 for their story, and they are essentially the same tasks just on different projects - that developer is 5x as productive as you are by their record.
When I brought it up to various PMs and execs, I got the same answer - "that's the way it's supposed to work."
And they used these point counts and burndowns to analyze performance of each dev in comparison with the rest of the team as a whole!
So if you estimated 1 point for your story, but some other dev estimated 5 for their story, and they are essentially the same tasks just on different projects - that developer is 5x as productive as you are by their record.
A related question: Should you do them? They don't seem useful in tiny companies, where you can just see how everyone is doing, apart from informal "What is worrying you" conversations. How big a company you have to be for them to be useful/necessary?
It's hard not to have some sort of review process if you want to be able to fire someone. If anyone challenges their dismissal for performance reasons, you'll want a record of the "conversations" (1) you had. This is why a lot of review processes include some sort of sign-off by the parties involved.
(1) Scare quotes around "conversations" because I've never seen management approach an underperforming employee and then realize that they had a big part in that. Conversations tend to be more two-way than that.
(1) Scare quotes around "conversations" because I've never seen management approach an underperforming employee and then realize that they had a big part in that. Conversations tend to be more two-way than that.
In our situation, which is a relatively small company, it's used to keep people energized, focused and well... happy.
Without it, we had regular team meetings where people talked about frustrations they had (and it exploded at times).
I don't think having it around as way to fire someone is the right approach.
I don't think having it around as way to fire someone is the right approach.
I'm a huge fan of more informal one-on-one meetings. To the point where I will consider a move if I'm not getting enough time with my management. I don't consider those "performance reviews" though.
I have found that the existence of a formal performance review program is a good proxy for a company's structure having grown and/or calcified to the point that I would no longer be happy to work there. If the startup I'm currently working for someday grows to that point, I'll take it as my cue to start looking for another startup.
The media have been very critical of Amazon's review process, partially fairly, but mostly not.
At the end of every year, I picked 5-10 people I wanted feedback from- teammates, people I've worked closely with, or people I genuinely wanted to get opinions from. They'd each receive an email that I'd requested their feedback and I'd receive around 10 requests for feedback from everyone who asked for mine. The only mandatory one: everyone reviews their boss.
As well, at any time throughout the year, "Anytime" feedback of an identical nature could be sent in. Usually, I sent these when someone had done something amazing and I worried I'd forget it before review time, or I don't work with them often.
Important to note: I can't ever read feedback given to me. I don't even know if anyone I requested feedback from actually gave it or not.
Each review itself took a lot of time to write, 20 to 60 minutes was normal for me. Everything was asked to be phrased in this way: Situation (what's the background on what happened?), Behavior (what did the person do?), Impact (what was the outcome, effect, etc?). You were expected to give a few good examples and a few bad examples.
At the end of all of this review writing, my manager would read through all of my feedbacks, and compile them into a single overall review with the common themes from many reviews.
Downside: bad managers exist. Here's one person who makes the entire decision and he's the only one reading your reviews. That's a lot of power and you need to trust your manager not to abuse it. Also, that feedback is anonymous to you. If someone is trying to sabotage you, you'd never know- but your manager would, as they can read who sent it.
Upside: if you're into personal growth, an annual review is candy. Here's an aggregate view of where you need to do better. With a good manager filtering out bullshit and finding the real patterns that matter, you got so much out of this.
On the other hand, it took like 2 days to write reviews, and you'd lose your manager for a week or two while he read and compiled.
Of course, I say all this and should be using past tense: due in large part to the media complaining that Amazonians are encouraged to "rat each other out", and that the feedback system was actually a toxic part of the culture, the company got rid of it all. Now you can only say short, nice things about each other and your manager has even more power that he'll never have to justify.
It was good while it lasted.
At the end of every year, I picked 5-10 people I wanted feedback from- teammates, people I've worked closely with, or people I genuinely wanted to get opinions from. They'd each receive an email that I'd requested their feedback and I'd receive around 10 requests for feedback from everyone who asked for mine. The only mandatory one: everyone reviews their boss.
As well, at any time throughout the year, "Anytime" feedback of an identical nature could be sent in. Usually, I sent these when someone had done something amazing and I worried I'd forget it before review time, or I don't work with them often.
Important to note: I can't ever read feedback given to me. I don't even know if anyone I requested feedback from actually gave it or not.
Each review itself took a lot of time to write, 20 to 60 minutes was normal for me. Everything was asked to be phrased in this way: Situation (what's the background on what happened?), Behavior (what did the person do?), Impact (what was the outcome, effect, etc?). You were expected to give a few good examples and a few bad examples.
At the end of all of this review writing, my manager would read through all of my feedbacks, and compile them into a single overall review with the common themes from many reviews.
Downside: bad managers exist. Here's one person who makes the entire decision and he's the only one reading your reviews. That's a lot of power and you need to trust your manager not to abuse it. Also, that feedback is anonymous to you. If someone is trying to sabotage you, you'd never know- but your manager would, as they can read who sent it.
Upside: if you're into personal growth, an annual review is candy. Here's an aggregate view of where you need to do better. With a good manager filtering out bullshit and finding the real patterns that matter, you got so much out of this.
On the other hand, it took like 2 days to write reviews, and you'd lose your manager for a week or two while he read and compiled.
Of course, I say all this and should be using past tense: due in large part to the media complaining that Amazonians are encouraged to "rat each other out", and that the feedback system was actually a toxic part of the culture, the company got rid of it all. Now you can only say short, nice things about each other and your manager has even more power that he'll never have to justify.
It was good while it lasted.
Ctl-V from above:
I know someone who works at Amazon just out of college.... out of 50 that started in June 17, they have 7 left... every week, people get rated and given a score out of 100%....every so often people are let go
I know someone who works at Amazon just out of college.... out of 50 that started in June 17, they have 7 left... every week, people get rated and given a score out of 100%....every so often people are let go
That's the craziest thing I have ever heard of. What role are they in? Is this some kind of paid interview process?
Like, I want to believe you but if you're talking about normal everyday developers it would be more reasonable for me to believe you are making this up or misunderstanding something. It just sounds that weird to me.
Like, I want to believe you but if you're talking about normal everyday developers it would be more reasonable for me to believe you are making this up or misunderstanding something. It just sounds that weird to me.
I don't want to say too much because I don't want my friend to get in trouble (only 7 left!)....they work on the products in a major US city and aren't developers.
Although we try to stay away from "creating a process" for everything, we've gradually implemented a way for people to give feedback more organically. The thing is, it's not the tool, form or questions you hand out - it's how people use them and think about them.
Over a period of time we started using Impraise (impraise.com), although it's not the best tool - it helps people to force to take the time and leave there current mindset to focus on something like giving feedback (on an equal base, because some people are just very good at giving feedback and keep on talking, while others are struggling and need to write it down). Every quarter, you review 2 other people. People read it, interpret it and carry on. However, I sit down with them after everyone has filled in the questions on Impraise (which are not the default ones, but they're pretty straightforward, like: "how good is the quality of your colleague's work?"). This information is used as a base to allow me to ask even more questions, like: "do you agree with this statement?" or "what could you do to improve this situation this colleague is describing?”. The result of this conversation are 4 things:
1. self reflection,
2. setting personal goals (which is mostly one of the things from the self reflection, getting more focus/attention than other things, which is not shared within the team),
3. create and/or help out with team goals, something we should improve as a team and shared within the team,
4. feedback on the process itself.
These results are written down as notes and then reflected on the next time we sit down.
We have some other tools, methods and things in place to have more of a continuous feedback loop - but it remains a living thing, rather than a set in stone method. If you have questions, you're always welcome to contact me :-)
Over a period of time we started using Impraise (impraise.com), although it's not the best tool - it helps people to force to take the time and leave there current mindset to focus on something like giving feedback (on an equal base, because some people are just very good at giving feedback and keep on talking, while others are struggling and need to write it down). Every quarter, you review 2 other people. People read it, interpret it and carry on. However, I sit down with them after everyone has filled in the questions on Impraise (which are not the default ones, but they're pretty straightforward, like: "how good is the quality of your colleague's work?"). This information is used as a base to allow me to ask even more questions, like: "do you agree with this statement?" or "what could you do to improve this situation this colleague is describing?”. The result of this conversation are 4 things:
1. self reflection,
2. setting personal goals (which is mostly one of the things from the self reflection, getting more focus/attention than other things, which is not shared within the team),
3. create and/or help out with team goals, something we should improve as a team and shared within the team,
4. feedback on the process itself.
These results are written down as notes and then reflected on the next time we sit down.
We have some other tools, methods and things in place to have more of a continuous feedback loop - but it remains a living thing, rather than a set in stone method. If you have questions, you're always welcome to contact me :-)
Hi David, interesting to read your post. My name is Bas Kohnke, co-founder/CEO of Impraise (YC Summer 14). We are always looking for new ways to improve our product, so please feel free to reach me at [email protected] if you are willing to share your experience and ideas. Thanks!
I have used this method at every startup I worked for. It will only work for companies that want to hire and keep good engineers. When you join the company, your manager will lay out your strengths and areas to improve to get to the next level (in a direction you want to go) in the very first meeting. Then, she meets with you every quarter and refines the vision for growth. Between those meetings, she'll create opportunities for you to challenge yourself, shine, and grow. That's it. All we care about is ownership, accountability, and leadership -- and your peers will keep you in check. Our job as leaders is to remove speed brakers and avoid pot holes. I can't think of a better way than this -- "performance" reviews are meaningless.
I highly recommend checking out Bryan Cantrill's talk from Surge 2013 - Leadership Without Management: Scaling Organizations by Scaling Engineers
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGkVM1B5NuI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGkVM1B5NuI
NSFW even with headphones due to some really funny moments.
Currently they don't exist - I've asked for a yearly one, but I suppose they haven't found time to give me a review.
I've been at my current position (C# Dev) for almost a year and a half full time and I worked part time for almost a half a year.
This seems to be far from normal, but since this is my first job out of school I really just want to see:
- If I'm performing to standard (Adding value) - which I think I am. - If raises are a thing at this company or in general with reviews.
We seem to be shifting towards a more I guess you could call it an "agile" approach (due to our PM). Daily standup meetings talking about what we will focus on for that day, allocate time for it, and report back the next day.
I've been at my current position (C# Dev) for almost a year and a half full time and I worked part time for almost a half a year.
This seems to be far from normal, but since this is my first job out of school I really just want to see:
- If I'm performing to standard (Adding value) - which I think I am. - If raises are a thing at this company or in general with reviews.
We seem to be shifting towards a more I guess you could call it an "agile" approach (due to our PM). Daily standup meetings talking about what we will focus on for that day, allocate time for it, and report back the next day.
You should really insist on a review. If you don't get feedback on how you're doing in your career, it's at your expense. My company has no formal process, I still force a review every year.
Also, I believe you should ask for a raise every year. Even if you've completely stagnated professionally, your salary is decreasing continuously with inflation.
Companies seem to take advantage of introverted people who are too afraid to speak up about perfectly reasonable requests, like clarifying your performance and goals. It definitely sounds like you're in that boat.
Also, I believe you should ask for a raise every year. Even if you've completely stagnated professionally, your salary is decreasing continuously with inflation.
Companies seem to take advantage of introverted people who are too afraid to speak up about perfectly reasonable requests, like clarifying your performance and goals. It definitely sounds like you're in that boat.
I've reached out via email 2-3 times and twice in person. At a _very_ informal meeting (about a project) I had mentioned it as well on 6/29, but nothing has been said to me since.
I'm not terribly sure how to go about forcing the issue when managers are unable to fit time into their schedule for me.
I wouldn't consider myself completely introverted, but I don't want to seem needy (ie: cutting into other people's busy days/schedules)
Hopefully I hear something back soon, but I'm not holding my breath.
I'm not terribly sure how to go about forcing the issue when managers are unable to fit time into their schedule for me.
I wouldn't consider myself completely introverted, but I don't want to seem needy (ie: cutting into other people's busy days/schedules)
Hopefully I hear something back soon, but I'm not holding my breath.
Fortune 500s...
Rating 1 - 5 (1 best, 5 worst).
Management required to restrict to rating quotas. These kick-in at a span-of-control level of around FTE>50, and below that at the span-of-control manager to manage. For some departments there's increased flexibility. Some managers who really don't see the reason for filling their quota of 'good' (3) sometimes trade with other managers. 1: ~3-5% 2: ~23-25% 3: ~50-60% 4-5: rest.
Formal performance reviews done annually, with interim (6 month) review. Now is 6 month stage.
1-1s on a bi-weekly basis, always documented.
Formal performance review an opportunity to highlight and push to one's manager what they may have forgotten or fell from their consciousness.
Rating 1 - 5 (1 best, 5 worst).
Management required to restrict to rating quotas. These kick-in at a span-of-control level of around FTE>50, and below that at the span-of-control manager to manage. For some departments there's increased flexibility. Some managers who really don't see the reason for filling their quota of 'good' (3) sometimes trade with other managers. 1: ~3-5% 2: ~23-25% 3: ~50-60% 4-5: rest.
Formal performance reviews done annually, with interim (6 month) review. Now is 6 month stage.
1-1s on a bi-weekly basis, always documented.
Formal performance review an opportunity to highlight and push to one's manager what they may have forgotten or fell from their consciousness.
I know someone who works at Amazon just out of college.... out of 50 that started in June 17, they have 7 left... every week, people get rated and given a score out of 100%....every so often people are let go
Have had two since I started at the place I'm at now. It's basically very nebulous "you're doing ok/you're not doing well in x" type reviews that they get from the departments you're contracted out too. Recommendations are usually "keep doing what you're doing/do more work/do work faster". You provide feedback forms for how you feel youre doing in various areas, but they're effectively useless as its the managers rebuttal that holds all the weight. There's rumours of career planning being integrated into the mix, but that's apparently been on the table for years with no change.
Had an associate of mine at the same company two weeks ago get a performance review (more of a contract since he had to sign it), that said he had to improve performance in a month or he'd be fired. The reasons? Too slow/too low quality, but no specific measurable metrics to meet that he'd be able to use to keep his job when re-evaluation comes up in a month.
Needless to say, performance evaluations aren't given a lot of thought here. Wish they were.
Had an associate of mine at the same company two weeks ago get a performance review (more of a contract since he had to sign it), that said he had to improve performance in a month or he'd be fired. The reasons? Too slow/too low quality, but no specific measurable metrics to meet that he'd be able to use to keep his job when re-evaluation comes up in a month.
Needless to say, performance evaluations aren't given a lot of thought here. Wish they were.
We stopped doing them a number of years ago after a discussion between management and HR where we all came to the conclusion they were not beneficial.
So how do you decide on promotions, bonuses, raises, etc? All of that has to happen via some process. If you're not doing any kind of performance reviews then you're allowing managers to do it arbitrarily.
There is a process, driven by actual reality rather than the (in my experience) highly artificial formal performance review process. fwiw when I worked as a manager in big companies, HR always told us that raises didn't depend on performance reviews...
We are a remote team, so metrics are very important for judging performance. Some of the most important metrics are: time online (huge one), PRs opened, PRs reviewed. There is a formal review process to give employees time to improve performance before an action is taken.
I find that even with all these formalities, actions tend to be totally up to the subjective judgment of management, just like any other company. Companies are not legally bound to abide by the rules of their own HR department -- HR is mainly there to provide an illusion of objectivity. In a conflict between leadership and rank-and-file workers, HR will always side with leadership. "Whose food I eat, his song I sing."
I find that even with all these formalities, actions tend to be totally up to the subjective judgment of management, just like any other company. Companies are not legally bound to abide by the rules of their own HR department -- HR is mainly there to provide an illusion of objectivity. In a conflict between leadership and rank-and-file workers, HR will always side with leadership. "Whose food I eat, his song I sing."
Why is time online big (assuming more means better)? I do remote too and I would never consider that to be important as long as the work gets done.
My pet hate is folks working from home who can't be contacted in a timely manner during the working day. I've personally no issue with remote working, but if my colleagues do it, I expect to be able to reach them as easily as I might if I could just walk to their desk in the office.
Depends on their role and what phase of the project you're in. Ideally remote work should be organised to be completely asynchronous which require good planning.
If you're employed full-time, the expectation is that you're giving your employer roughly 40 hours a week. Nobody can code continuously for 8 hours a day and be productive, but just being available is the bare minimum you can do to be considered "working."
I've never heard anyone get cool points at our company for being online more than 8 hours a day, but being online less than that (without reason) is definitely frowned upon.
I've never heard anyone get cool points at our company for being online more than 8 hours a day, but being online less than that (without reason) is definitely frowned upon.
I don't see the point: it seems like the company you're at is more or less putting the infrastructure cost (rent, internet) on its employees and otherwise treating them as though they ought to be working as if on-premises in a "butts in the seat" style.
Seems like a great way to motivate employees to keep slack open while remaining totally unengaged...
How do you measure time online?
We use Slack
The flip-side seems to be that if you close Slack for a few hours of focussed work on something tricky, that's counted the same as spending the afternoon at the beach.
Sure, communication is important, but there are relatively few things that can't wait half a day (and for those, there are alternative channels if you're not on Slack)
Sure, communication is important, but there are relatively few things that can't wait half a day (and for those, there are alternative channels if you're not on Slack)
Not to mention that Slack is a total resource hog. I only use Slack on my phone now, for that reason. The online indicator therefore doesn't work as expected since it deactivates when the app goes into background.
I've had a manager in the recent past try to call me out on it, even though I was always in contact within seconds/minutes..."yeah but Slack doesn't show you as online..."
I've had a manager in the recent past try to call me out on it, even though I was always in contact within seconds/minutes..."yeah but Slack doesn't show you as online..."
Write a bot to send a random /giphy to #general every 1-2 hours, you'll fit right in.
How do you use Slack to document online status? Does someone maintain a record of status timestamps? That sounds terribly degrading not to mention a bureaucratic nightmare. And it's very easily gamed. But most importantly, you should challenge the notion that time online is a good performance metric.
If terribly degrading bureaucratic nightmares are a deal breaker for you, I'd stay away from large corporations in general.
So write a bot to stay online all day? lol
We do a 1-5 point based system bi-yearly, but I'm actually wondering how people respond to under performing coworkers. I feel weighed down a bit because a review is coming up and I can't imagine giving said person more than a 2, but he is also a nice guy and tries very hard while simultaneously making a mess of most things.
Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated. We're typically asked to discuss negative feedback with managers beforehand and it's important to note that these reviews are not anonymous.
Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated. We're typically asked to discuss negative feedback with managers beforehand and it's important to note that these reviews are not anonymous.
If a person is congenial and dependable there's usually a suitable niche in any large enough org. The sweet spot is where things are stable and include domain knowledge but aren't automatable yet.
Good team players that will get along with people and keep things running are very worthwhile in my opinion. Not everyone need to be able to invent their own crypto currency from scratch.
If the problem is more severe, like an inability to code at all, then they might just be in the wrong line of work.
Good team players that will get along with people and keep things running are very worthwhile in my opinion. Not everyone need to be able to invent their own crypto currency from scratch.
If the problem is more severe, like an inability to code at all, then they might just be in the wrong line of work.
It doesn't. You may ask how then do they do raises? Largely, they don't. The only way they manage to attract and keep people for at least a short period (average tenure is short) is through the ever increasing value of the stock options. Those are only awarded when you first join however so for those who do manage to hold on for 4 years until they fully vest there is zero incentive to stay longer. This is a major fintech company.
At Microsoft, (so the throwaway account).
In theory: peer review + manager comment on : your work, how you help others, how you reuse work done by other.
The reality: peer review is quite useless (that can help manager to give examples feedback but nothing more). Manager's opinion on your work is the only thing. So a big theorical system with bunch of HR documentation but a terrible / useless process at the end.
Twice a year we do reviews. I have some KPIs I collect for my team, but most managers don't. We also have the standard HR matrix of 1-5 scaling, but I think it's actually quite effective at providing a framework.
Employees do self-assessments, then managers do assessments, then you meet for your review. The review is more about being on the same page + communicating future expectations.
Employees do self-assessments, then managers do assessments, then you meet for your review. The review is more about being on the same page + communicating future expectations.
Yes; we have quarterly "check-in" reviews and a larger yearly review where salary is considered. The process consists of peer and self reviews. We used to have a rating system as well where in the yearly review you would get a certain rating out of five options depending on how you did. The rating portion was removed a couple of years ago.
Large company. Performance reviews always come with a non-negotiable raise. The raise + budget issues result in 2-5 year gaps between employees getting them.
Hey I’m Bas Kohnke, YC S14 alum and CEO of Impraise (https://impraise.com), a feedback based performance management solution. Having worked with different types of companies to revamp their performance management processes, I’d be happy to share some of our thoughts and experiences.
Internally, we run quarterly 360 degree reviews based on 3 questions: what should this person, continue, stop, and start doing. Each person comes up with their own goals and projects which they’re evaluated on. In between reviews we share real-time feedback so that people always know where they stand and what they can do to improve - in this way review results are never a surprise. Team leads also hold regular 1-on-1s and check-ins with each team member (at least twice a month).
A few things we’ve learned:
- Simply prompting people to share more feedback isn’t enough. Education on how to formulate actionable feedback and how to take and internalize received feedback is essential for it to actually be effective
- Strengths based feedback[1] is highly motivating
- Reviews should always be followed up with 1-on-1 conversations during which a development plan is formed
- Continuous feedback throughout the year is essential to keep everyone on track and ensure that people aren’t blindsided during reviews
- Continuous and 360 degree feedback can help combat bias[2] in performance reviews
- If reviews are results based, goal-setting should always include equal input from the individual and their team lead
There’s not a one size fits all approach to performance management, yet so many companies try to fit their organization into a standard model. Many companies are now customizing their own processes, picking and choosing the elements that work best for their size, industry, culture and the specific pains they want to solve. For example:
- Ratings vs ratingless reviews
- Anonymity vs non-anonymous reviews
- Reviews linked to compensation decisions vs reviews focused solely on development
- Companies allowing people to choose their own reviewers
- Results vs competency based reviews
For advice on the different performance management trends we’ve seen working, feel free to reach out to us.
[1] https://blog.impraise.com/360-feedback/constructive-feedback...
[2] https://blog.impraise.com/360-feedback/4-factors-hurting-you...
Internally, we run quarterly 360 degree reviews based on 3 questions: what should this person, continue, stop, and start doing. Each person comes up with their own goals and projects which they’re evaluated on. In between reviews we share real-time feedback so that people always know where they stand and what they can do to improve - in this way review results are never a surprise. Team leads also hold regular 1-on-1s and check-ins with each team member (at least twice a month).
A few things we’ve learned:
- Simply prompting people to share more feedback isn’t enough. Education on how to formulate actionable feedback and how to take and internalize received feedback is essential for it to actually be effective
- Strengths based feedback[1] is highly motivating
- Reviews should always be followed up with 1-on-1 conversations during which a development plan is formed
- Continuous feedback throughout the year is essential to keep everyone on track and ensure that people aren’t blindsided during reviews
- Continuous and 360 degree feedback can help combat bias[2] in performance reviews
- If reviews are results based, goal-setting should always include equal input from the individual and their team lead
There’s not a one size fits all approach to performance management, yet so many companies try to fit their organization into a standard model. Many companies are now customizing their own processes, picking and choosing the elements that work best for their size, industry, culture and the specific pains they want to solve. For example:
- Ratings vs ratingless reviews
- Anonymity vs non-anonymous reviews
- Reviews linked to compensation decisions vs reviews focused solely on development
- Companies allowing people to choose their own reviewers
- Results vs competency based reviews
For advice on the different performance management trends we’ve seen working, feel free to reach out to us.
[1] https://blog.impraise.com/360-feedback/constructive-feedback...
[2] https://blog.impraise.com/360-feedback/4-factors-hurting-you...
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