What do you put as goals in your work appraisal when you don’t have any?

[DisorganisedOrganiser]

I have my appraisal coming up in a month. My work are really hot on them and we have them like clockwork every year. We have to come in with goals for the next year and lots of other paperwork filled in.

My job is ok but I am basically in it for the hours and the fact that sometimes it can be amazing. Most of the time it is ok and the alternatives in my profession are far worse so I stay. I have no goals aside from carry on with what I am doing and genuinely try to do a good job.

Funding for staff training is frozen due to finance pressures so no point mentioning courses I would like to do. I have done most of what I can do to progress and without aiming for promotion I have no further training or experience to gain.

I am in it because we need the money and the hours suit. If I won the lottery I’d leave tomorrow. My boss is horrible and is obsessed with targets, measurable objectives and thinks people should progress at all costs, as long as the progressions they want involve sitting in pointless meetings and staying late.

Any tips?

Share best practice on something you’ve recently done some training on with the team. Then all you have to do is a bit of input at a meeting.

Ooh thank you! That’s a great idea. Anything involving a meeting makes her happy.

Build on progress to date, with an emphasis on enhancing team efficiency

Mentor / support junior or less experienced team members?

How about:

• process efficiency with a view to continuous development - could you tweak or improve something
• improving inter-team/project communication - regular update email/meeting etc etc
• process review with a view to improvement? You could gather 'stakeholder viewpoints' bla bla
• becoming more involved in X (business strategic goal) by attending X meetings/working groups
• something about workplace wellbeing/diversity/employee engagement - so get involved in a cake sale/workplace event

Basically my workplace looked for stuff about

• improvement and efficiency
• knowledge sharing or employee engagement/wellbeing
• something strategic. I found just using the work 'strategy' worked
• communication links between team/locations/geographies

Any of this stuff got a big tick and a pat on the back. Didn't matter if it was true or not tbh

Wow you guys are good, thank you! I do actually genuinely want us to use a bit less paper and try to be more environmentally friendly so maybe I can dress that up as improving efficiency.

Re. mentoring junior staff. I do and can but tbh I work very few hours and within a few months I can see them overtaking me, it’s almost painful, especially if they are full time and keen . I am firmly on the mummy track (apologies to anyone that offends) and am not sure how to hide that really.

Unhelpful answer (but probably most honest): remain employed

Look at the organisation's business plan/strategy and see if there are any tasks/projects you can do that align with those.

Could you talk about that at all? Companies want to be family-friendly, retain talent and so on, but the fact you feel mummy-tracked suggests that your employer isn't quite there just yet... Talking about the challenges of less than full time working and pressure to progress is an important conversation as this is what makes many women feel under-valued. But if you just want to say some stuff to get them off your back, then yes, improved Comms are always needed in almost any organisation.

Do you mean goals for the coming year or goals you should have been working to for the last year?

What are the bits that are sometimes amazing? How can you make them a bigger proportion of what you do on a day to day basis?

Thanks all, really useful. While I agree with you Corpore, it’s just not worth bringing it up. My boss is very much of the opinion that she has a child and works full time all the hours God sends so everyone else should be able to as well.

altiara, I mean goals for the next year. I hope I’ve achieved my goals for last year although I cannot find my appraisal paperwork so can’t remember what I wrote . One goal I had funding was pulled for so that’s me off the hook.

It’s all such a load of horse shit isn’t it 🤣

Some good replies above. Nice bit of corporate nonsense to keep them happy.

All done for another year. In fact, save the thread, you can use some different ones next year.

If they stopped wasting time and money on this shit they might be able to afford to do some interesting training courses 🙄

You sound like the perfect kind of employee. Every team requires a good percentage of staff that come in and consistently deliver.

That sounds like you, and you should be a managers dream, I hope they appreciate you.

WingBingo, interesting . Perhaps I can sell myself as consistent.

Great idea Incredible .

mynameis, I’m not sure how to say what’s amazing without outing myself. I don’t think I can make them a bigger proportion although I realise that is an annoying answer of mine if I am unwilling to explain.

As an example, one of the awesome things is when I get to be involved in managing unusual events that happen in the business. But by their nature they are unusual so I cannot do more of them. If that makes sense? Plus they are the fun stuff so even if I could do more of them they need to be shared out in the team.

Some great answers here (place marking as going through same bollocks next week myself)

Some of these are brilliant! Shamelessly stealing the ideas!

Glad to have helped .

What's the mummy track as I'm wondering if I'm on it!

To me it is where you have no chance of promotion to high level stuff or you may get promoted but not particularly high up. Training opportunities reduced etc. You see people not on the mummy track overtaking you.

To be fair I sort of chose it. I don’t want to work long hours. I don’t want to do a load of extra study and I don’t really care about promotion although of course the extra money would be nice.