It was the evening before the performance review conversation with my manager. I was very stressed because my manager skipped many of our 1:1 meetings and did not share feedback with me, so I had no idea how I was doing. I was glad to finally find out!

A few days prior, I submitted my self-assessment including facts, explanations and examples I had been continuously gathering for the past 6 months.

I was utterly shocked when my manager presented an empty performance review to me. It included only numeric ratings on the four dimensions, which he rationalized as subjective.

The whole thing took a few minutes and did not give me any idea what I had been doing well and what to improve on.

That day I decided that I will change this.

Very often, the “best” team member (whatever “best” means) is “promoted” into a management role with zero guidance and training. They then repeat trivial mistakes on the backs of their direct reports, leading to poor results and attrition, mistakes that could have been prevented with a short time investment.

I spent long time learning about management and eventually became a manager, where I could apply all the knowledge and share actionable guidance.

My mission is to continue spreading this knowledge to prevent repeating the same mistakes over and over.