THE DREADED ANNUAL REVIEW
Here comes 2005! It's great to be a business owner, isn't it? We just close the books on 2004, hand everything over to the accountant and start all over again with a clean slate. Many of the "employees" of the world have a different process to go through at this time of the year - "The dreaded annual review"! Ever work for a big company that did these? I sure did, and some years it wasn't something I looked forward to!
Why do companies do this to their employees? A few reasons: They may want to be very truthful and honest with their employees and make sure that the employee gets very clear feedback about where they are, what they've done well, what they need to work on. Many companies decide how much (if any) raise there will be for the employees. They go through an elaborate process, essentially putting each employee into a category of Poor, Fair, Good or Excellent. Sometimes this is done on a series of skill sets for the position. Based on this assessment and how long they've been in that position - a new salary just appears on the employee's paycheck.
So, as a business owner - Who does YOUR annual review? If the answer is - "No one, thank you very much," I'd like to invite you to change that this year. Why should you do this for yourself? At least once each year, you need to take the long view of what happened in the business, and where you're going to go for the next year. But how do we do this review and take the word "DREADED" out of it? Here are my 7 easy steps to doing just that:
1. Get Comfortable - One past client of mine did this process with "a fine cigar and a bottle of scotch while sitting in front of a roaring fire in the fireplace". Whatever your equivalent is - do it. Get comfy.
2. Grab your set of goals and objectives for the past year - if you have a printed set of goals and objectives for the year, you're done with this step. If not, think back to January of the last year and make up a list of things you would have like to accomplished.
3. Give yourself a rating on each objective - I'm old school, so I do "A" through "F". Yes, it may be difficult - but rate each one as objectively as you can.
4. Now add to the list the things that happened that you didn't plan for - The good as well as the bad. Rate these as well - however you did it in step three.
5. Wipe out the "Dumb Ideas" that were on the plan - This is always a fun step, looking back on some of the things that you thought were important goals or objectives for the year, and now seeing that they really were dumb ideas. (These were probably objectives that got low ratings, so you get to have fun here wiping out the low scores).
6. Write down at least five things that you learned last year - Heck, you just spent another year as a business owner, you must have learned at least five things about yourself, your business, your views of the world. Write 'em down.
7. Create this year's plan - Take the objectives for the prior year that weren't hit but are still important and write them down. That's the base. Now brainstorm/dream/wish list other ideas for objectives for the year. Add in anything that comes from the list of things that you learned last year.
Feel free to use the worksheet I've designed at the bottom of this email. It will give you the format for everything. Just "fill in the blanks."
Now what about that pay raise for you? It will come as you do the process I just described. It may not start next week or month, but follow this process and you'll be quite pleased with the raise you're able to give yourself this year.
Till next time,
Copyright 2004 Jerry Wistrom and All Out Coaching, LLC
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