By Frank Benest | Jul 6, 2020

Dear Frank –
     I’m an administrative services manager in a large special district. I have five direct reports who are talented and mostly want to be challenged and grow. Once a year I’m required to complete a performance evaluation for each of my direct reports and then meet individually with them to review the evaluation. What a waste of time! I hate performance evaluations!

     This annual ritual sucks the life out of me as well as my employees. In addition, when I meet with an employee to go over the review, the staff person seems to get defensive even if it is a mostly good performance review.

     I can’t avoid the performance evaluation. However, do you have any suggestions to make it a better and more energizing experience?

For Dr. Benest’s full response and advise on this issue, please click here.

Sponsored by the ICMA Coaching Program, ICMA Career Compass is a monthly column from ICMA focused on career issues for local government professional staff.

Dr. Frank Benest is ICMA’s liaison for Next Generation Initiatives and resides in Palo Alto, California.

If you have a career question you would like addressed in a future Career Compass, e-mail careers@icma.org or contact Frank directly at frank@frankbenest.com. Read past columns at icma.org/careercompass. You can also subscribe to ICMA Career Compass by selecting any issue, and look for the blue subscription box.