My PMS

Appraisal for anything is something which I really hate since a small kid. I hate to be appraised by someone who doesn’t fully understand the context of my situation but, still trying to say something. I hate it more when someone started telling me what was wrong because this de-motivates me a lot. Due to which, I never read paper when my favorite team or player lost in a match as the paper carry lot of post-mortem of what went wrong. To me what is more important is self-introspection.

In the history of our company, the result of appraisals and bonuses were announcement in first week of May compare to traditional of announcing in August or November.

HR department had lived up to its own promised and delivered things on time. The whole process started some 45 days before at the full steam with a trial run in December with the name mid-term review. For a change, the biggies (my super boss and above) were taking it very seriously for the PMS process. I happened to sit with my super boss for lunch one day. He happened to ask me about PMS completion from my side which was bit un-natural for him. In so many years, he had never asked me such questions other than projects and completion deadlines. That perhaps, shows the seriousness this time.

But, when the result came out it was the same old story. Old wine in new bottle. Because many of things were beyond justifications and answers.

After many rounds of discussions, debates and suspense the results were announced. Many of my colleagues were happy and elated and some were dejected and disappointed. One of them was me. The result was truly unexpected for me at least. The reviewer comment for me was really great and good but, at the end it was bad.

Many of the grading both for low and high are still difficult to understand including mine. The explanation given by my appraiser was shifting the blame to other and the so-called bell-curved rather than giving me the right answer. After getting the letter, I blasted my boss and told what I felt. They showed a worrying and concerned face to me. He insisted me to speak to HR for more clarity but, I declined because I knew it couldn’t be change and getting unwanted explanations and good words at this time was least invited.

The next day I skipped the office on the pretext that my wife was ill but, the real answer was due to feeling of dejection and disappointment. My boss knew it. He called me and many of my colleagues also called me with his courtesy trying to console.

Perhaps, I have grown a bit mature because things sunk faster than I thought. Next day in office, I kept quiet and did my things which were expected but, avoided all the possible debates with my boss inspite of his best effort to get me talking.

Yesterday, there was annual party of my office. I also skipped the same. HR with my boss itself was in full force to appease me. But, I avoided all the debates because I didn’t have the capacity to listen any explanation other than myself. I’m keeping things to myself including the disappointment for now.

Currently, I’m doing self-introspection for what went wrong and what went right for the last year. One thing is pretty clear that I helped people before being asked for help and many times I volunteered myself for my things. Perhaps, due to this I had been taken for granted. This is going to be changed.

I remembered when my father told me that “Never help someone unless asks for the same because this lessens your importance and value.”