Wednesday, June 03, 2009

Don't you just love your annual appraisal?

One of the special joys for me is asking my colleagues to provide me with a 360 degree appraisal form - ie, ask everyone from the Head of Service to the caretaker what they think of me and my work. It is always so embarrassing to read so much praise about moi, moi, moi. And obviously I love the opportunity to complete them on behalf of my much valued colleagues: "So and so is a skiving toss bag."

And it's appraisal time again folks. (Yes, so soon after with much sighing of 'Thank god that shite is over for another year' we finished the last ones.)

But wait! What is this that comes down to us from the new powers that be? It is our new 360 degree appraisal form! Hark for what is this I hear?

The excitement!

The consternation?

The howls of derision.

SO last year is responding to whether or not our various team members:

1. Always do what they say they will

2. take responsibility

3. learn from their mistakes

4. strive for excellence

5. act on facts

6. treat people fairly.

Not for this go ahead organisation matey boy - oh no.

Instead we are invited to mark each other on a scale to 1-4 under the following (mystifying) headings:


1. Get on the bus / Lets go faster. (The first bus out of town?)

2. Treat people as human / Team N------shire (Treat people as human? That's a new one on me.)

3. Make Staff future proof / Golden Roller Skate ( Botox us? And Golden Roller Skate? That's crystal clear what they are asking there isn't it? (Any suggestions gratefully received as I am going to have to work with this.) )


4. Taste the Small Red Fruit* (The Times may say that but I couldn't possibly comment.)

5. Deliver on promises / Deliver, deliver, deliver (Do they want us to deliver perchance?)

6. Face it / Tackle wicked issues ( In the modern or traditional sense of the word 'wicked'?)

7. Do your job /Job plus (They want us to do our job??? What will they want next - blood?)

8. Develop a toolkit / Nimble and savvy (This one has totally defeated me. I have absolutely no idea what they are asking here. More suggestions anyone? )




It's Management Speak gone mad I tell ya!


In fact I would go further and say it is management gone mad. Does it not occur to them upstairs that the ordinary employee has not the first idea how we are supposed to use those headings as any kind of a basis for a meaningful appraisal system? Does it also not occur to them that the reaction of the ordinary employee to such headings will inevitably be along the lines of "What a load of bollocks."


* Rhymes with Law and is a berry. Just being aware of google searches here.



P.S. The power of google led me to discover ours is not the only rebranding going on. See here for the unfortunate result of paying vast sums of money to a London design company. I like the article's heading: 'UK Office of Government Commerce cracks one off.'

8 comments:

Yorkshire Pudding said...

What a load of bollocks - from an ordinary guy or as Reidski might say "What a load of f***ing sh*te!" Every time I have received my 360 degree appraisal envelope I have ripped it up and chucked it in the bin without reading it and I have also managed to never fill in anybody else's appraisal questionnaires. Incredibly, nobody has ever nagged me or pursued me over these matters which just goes to emphasise how utterly stupid the whole thing is.

trousers said...

Yep, utter bollocks. What the feck are they trying to do?

Gill said...

It's obvious what has been going on, somebody in a position of power has ACTUALLY gone mad and nobody has noticed because everyone is so used to bizarre assessment forms.

Gill said...

Oh! I've got it now. It takes a poet to work out this kind of metaphorical shite. All you have to do is fill in your form with these answers and send it back.
1-Olive and Blakey
2-Mr Spock
3-Dr Gunther von Hagen's bodyworlds on ice
4-Jam
5-Parcelforce
6-Ghostbusters
7-Yes! but I don't have time because I'm filling in a form
8-Not sure but I think it's something to do with Low calorie bread? Or a hot air ballooon?

You can send me my consultant's fee later. Ta!

Karen said...

If our SWs, AMHPs and CPNs had to fill in this bollocks then there would be uproar and they would refuse to do it!

Us admin lot have recently been asked to fill out a form of how long we spend each day doing certain tasks. It is really hard to fill out because you don't always finish one task before you are asked to do another, so you're supposed to log in onto a piece of paper and then add it to a spreadsheet at the end of the day. I said we should have a section "time taken to fill this stupid form in - 1 hr" everyday.

But we have decided not to fill it in at all until management (and that's high up management in the locality, not our team management) give us a reason why they want us to fill it in. We are suspicious they're trying to downgrade us or move us to diffrent departments, or something entirely more sinister that we haven't even contemplated.

Anonymous said...

Really, JJ, get with the programme! Where's your pride in the brand?

Yours disgustedly
Messalina

Gill said...

omg! I hope you didn't use the answers I sent you as I realise the answer to number 3 was wrong! It should have been dr gunther von hagen's starlight express of course. Sorry about that, hope your are not sacked for incompetence. my fee will be reduced accordingly :-)

J.J said...

YP - it is just a tick box exercise with us, but I know managers get hounded to ensure those boxes do indeed get ticked.

Trousers - no other word describes it quite so accurately.

Gill - I think you have identified how this new form came to be.

Your (amended in light of your last comment) fee is of course in the post!

Karen - forms and paperwork - the curse of the working population.

Messalina - 'Going forward, let's diarize and book-in a hook up to touch base so you can communicate the right methodology' to me.'