Friday, January 14, 2005

How's My Performance? Did The Earth Move For You?

(warning - work related rant. Apologies in advance to efficient, hardworking and dedicated Human Resources staff. Please come and work for my company.)

Oh joy, its appraisal time. Part of the joy of American corporate ownership is that I find myself subject to the whims of the entirely pointless department known as Human Resources.

Ok, not entirely pointless. They hire staff and organise training. Oh, wait a minute; I had to hire and fire staff myself and sort out my own training and that of the people working for me. HR were too busy. So what exactly is it that this department does?

Demand appraisal forms, thats what. Where before an appraisal was generally an informal, ongoing thing where the boss would stop by every now and then and say "You're utterly rubbish, Newly, why did I ever hire you?" now there's a form that needs to be completed, replete with touchy-feely questions such as

"How do you feel you've performed?" (answer: "Bloody fantastic. I'm great, me.")
"Where are your weaknesses?" (answer: "Weaknesses? What weaknesses? See answer number 1.")
"Would you like us to order softer toilet tissue?"

Ok, so I made the last one up.

And the worst thing is the title: "Performance Roadmap For Success". For goodness sake - its a one page questionnaire. The odds are that the title came from a mission statement rejected for being too short and lacking the word "empowerment"

The worst thing is that aside from the odd trough, I genuinely enjoy much of what I do and I am really good at it - I learnt this week that my job is changing this year into something very exciting. I particularly enjoy working for my boss. But the barriers and paperwork thrown up by this particular department make me weary.

The boss and I have concluded that I'll do two forms. One that we'll actually discuss, and then something suitably bland and HR-friendly that I'll sign. The one that has:

"Where do you see yourself in 5 years?"
Mostly working from a chalet near a mountain that is stunning in summer and skiiable in winter (note: France has had the worst snow for the last 30 years this year – possible relocation to US or Canada)
Stand-in for any male Hollywood star during those embarrassing-to-film sex scenes with pouting starlets (that a word for an actress, not the badly built Japanese car of the 80s and early 90s)

Won't be submitted. Unless my boss decides to play a really nasty trick on me...