Taking time out to carry out your own performance mid-year review is crucial for your own career progression and development. It’s a great way to:
- Check that you are progressing toward your goals
- Ensure your goals are still relevant
- Review your successes so far
- Reflect on what is and isn’t working.
- Determine your next 6 months actions
- Identify skills gaps and relevant training needs
We recommend that you carry out performance reviews at least once every 6 months. Ideally once a month would be good to review progress and development.
The process for personal reviews
We have a 9 step process that we recommend to our customers and employees.
1 – Set-up
An often-overlooked aspect, ensuring your environment is right is crucial. Make this away from your normal working environment and in a place where you feel inspired and won’t be interrupted.
Make sure though that you have all of the information you’ll need to review and assess your progress.
2 – Have my goals changed?
Once you are settled than the first question to ask is are the goals I’m working on still relevant? Goals are always in the future and based on your predictions, therefore when you come to review things might have changed.
Therefore, ensure that the goals you have are relevant and know your motivation behind working towards them? Visualise this, and how you’ll feel when you’ll hit your goals.
3 – How am I progressing?
It’s good to review the progress you’ve made towards achieving your goals. As humans, we are continually developing but we don’t always appreciate how much, so consider how far you have developed in that period of time. Use the mid-year review to do this.
4 – What successes have I had?
Be honest and realistic. If you’ve made excellent progress then pat yourself on the back. If you haven’t then don’t beat yourself up. There may be valid reasons why you haven’t, for example, an unexpected business project or change within your organisation.
5 – What’s working well
If you are making progress then identify what action you are taking which is helping you. Consider what impact your colleagues, managers, friends and family are having. For example, is your manager allowing you time to work on a specific project, are colleagues working with you and are family understanding if you have to work late?
6 – What’s not working well.
What’s stopping you progress to your goals quicker? Are there any blockers? What can you control and influence and what is beyond your control.
At this point, it’s about leaving emotion behind and thinking practically. What tools, systems and techniques will you need to implement to change anything that’s not working well.
7 – What skills gaps do I have?
What areas of your skills, knowledge and behaviour do you need to improve to achieve your goals? For example, if you are in sales would you close more customers if you have better presentation or questions skills?
8 – What actions are needed?
Vision without action is merely a dream. Action without vision just passes the time. Vision with action can change the world. – Joel A. Barker
So make sure you have a detailed action list, knowing what you are going to do and when you’ll do it.
9 – Set the next review date
Make sure that these are diarised and on a regular basis. If you can, have a review monthly to record the numbers so that any 6 monthly reviews focus more on the overall goals.
We have a dedicated team who can help you discuss your goal progression, identify any potential skills gaps and source the best training solutions to help with your needs.
Get in touch by email customercare@optimuslearningservices.com or call 0845 519 7408.
