unfair performance rating, inaccurate scheduling, and more

by Alison Green on November 9, 2013

It’s five short answers to five short questions!

(Yes, five instead of the usual seven. I’m experimenting with doing shorter-than-usual posts on Saturday and Sunday.)

1. I was rated poorly on attendance when I don’t actually have an attendance problem

I had my annual review today and was upset to see that I was rated poorly on attendance. I went back through my records, and I took all vacation allotted to me and used 4 sick days in 12 months, One of those was after a work trip that I didn’t arrive home from until midnight the night before calling in sick. In my company, I have been reviewed in the past as excellent for attendance and I am confident that I used more sick days then, because I had small children at the time. We have a “use it or lose it” vacation policy and most employees use all vacation days, I actually know of no one who doesn’t use all of their days.

I am also confident that other employees have missed more time than I have and I am very confident they did not receive negative scores on attendance. I contacted my supervisor after mentioning in the review that the score was not correct. I supplied details of the missing days and explained that attendance is a measurable metric and that the data should be used to score me in this area, not someone’s opinion that they don’t see me at work. He said his boss said my attendance was poor in discussing my review and to mark me down on this area, He replied to this email by saying it’s all about perception. He suggested I walk about the office and talk with people more often. I’m busy doing my job, instead of chit chatting with people to prove I’m in the building . Am I correct in asserting that attendance is measurable and that data should be used, rather than the impression that I’m not around because I don’t hang out on the first floor?

Your manager sucks, and yes, actual data should be used to assess attendance, not a general “feeling” that someone isn’t at work enough. And if someone has that feeling, then your manager should get to the bottom of why, not just blindly mark you down on attendance when the data doesn’t support it.

That said, in your justifiable anger over this, you don’t want to lose sight of the fact that his boss thinking you’re not there enough IS a problem. It’s not a problem with your actual attendance, but something’s going on there, and you do want to figure that out: Why does his boss have that impression of you, after all? What has happened to cause it and what could you do to address it? But that’s a separate issue, and rating your poorly on attendance when the facts don’t back it up is BS.

2. Manager regularly schedules me for more hours than I’m supposed to work

What is the best way to handle a manager who expects me not to work over 20 hours but continually schedules me for more than that? I feel it’s likely just a manner of her not counting or paying attention to her schedule closely enough. I’m sure I can’t tell her, “You don’t know how to count!”

Just be straightforward: “Jane, I keep ending up scheduled for more than 20 hours in a week, which means I then have to come back to you to have the schedule revised. Is there anything I can do differently to make sure that I don’t get more than 20 hours a week to begin with?” (I’m assuming here that you’re telling her each time to take away some of those excess hours; if you’re not, you need to start there, by pointing it out each time it happens.)

3. Employer says they have to wait until after the holidays to schedule more interviews

What does it mean if an employer you interviewed with tells you that they now have to wait until after the holidays to hire anyone after you have gone through the second interview process?

It means you have to wait until after the holiday before they move forward. I don’t mean to be snarky; that’s really what it means. If you’re asking about why this might happen, it could be anything — a decision-maker on vacation until then, a budget or hiring freeze, a staffing issue that needs to be worked out first, another project taking priority over hiring, or all sorts of other things. I’d just make a note to follow up with them in early January and put it out of your mind until then.

4. Do I have to use sick leave for a few hours away at an appointment?

I’m a nurse practitioner at a clinic and work 40 hours/week, as an exempt employee. Occasionally I need to have a partial day off for appointments, etc. I also have a fickle manager who changes her mind constantly.

If I’m exempt and I take a few hours off am I required to take sick leave for the few hours off? In the past, I’ve been paid for a full day when I’ve left early, but recently she has made me change my time sheet and insisted I make up the time with sick leave.

That’s allowed. It’s a poor policy, in my opinion, but it’s allowed. She can’t dock your pay for that period (that’s where being exempt comes in), but she can dock your paid leave.

5. Coworkers are discussing me inappropriately at work

Recently at work, I have managed to split myself away from a group of peers in a separate business team who I used to socialize with but found to be very rude and just generally people I would not like to be friends with. This was fine until a colleague in my team overheard them discussing me in a less than positive light in a public lunch area in my office that’s often used by clients. My colleague was very embarrassed on my behalf. (They were being petty about not having access to my personal Facebook photos after a number of inappropriate comments were made by them on pictures of a work night out.) I find it very inappropriate that they would talk like this in an area where my clients might overhear (and where my colleagues have).

Do you have any advice on how best to proceed? Should I carry on doing my best to avoid them, in the hope that they will get over it, or should I confront this behaviour head on. They’re the sort of people who I feel if I confront them it will turn into a bigger problem.

It doesn’t sound like you have much to gain by confronting them. I’d let it go and focus on being professional, and assume that anyone who overhears them will know that the issue is more with them than with you.

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{ 54 comments }

{ 54 comments… read them below }

  1. Jake*

    #1-

    I’m not sure if the OP is exempt or not, or what the OP’s company culture is, but I can see where this could be a low score without a justified “metric.”

    I’m an exempt employee, but our project pays straight-time OT. The OT rules are strange, but the gist of it is you can’t get paid for more than 10 hours a day, so when we work 6 or 7 12 hour shifts a week we get paid for 60 or 70 hours. As an aside, it is a pretty sweet gig getting paid OT in spite of our exempt status.

    All that being said, it is very strongly frowned upon to turn down overtime, or to leave after only 10 hours of work. If an employee started only working 10 hours a day, and turned down all overtime work, our management would definitely score them very low in an attendance rating, and might even put them on a PIP, depending on their position.

    I don’t know if the OP is in a similar position where management isn’t seeing the type of production they would expect, so are assuming they are not putting in enough hours or if there is some other underlying thing going on, but it is clear there is an issue somewhere.

    1. Chuchundra*

      I doubt that any job where you work 72 or 84 hours a week and get paid for 60 or 70 hours could be called “sweet”.

      I work 12 hour shifts and the idea of working six or seven of them in a week on a semi-regular basis is pretty unsettling, and I get paid OT for every hour I work over 40.

      2. Jake*

        Based on the rest of our industry, it is sweet. Our industry is based around these kinds of hours for 6-8 months at a time, followed by 4-6 months of “down time.” In 90% of these cases, you are expected to work these kinds of hours for no overtime at all. The fact that we get paid for most of them is actually a huge benefit.

        Also, we get compensated accordingly. Our jobs are not overly difficult, and yet we still get paid quite well. This is to make up for the fact that your life is nothing but work for 1/2 or 2/3 of the year every year.

        Finally, we knew what we were getting into when we signed up for it. It isn’t like this is a surprise to anybody that works heavy civil construction, on the craft or staff side.

      3. Lindsay J*

        I’ve worked 12 hour days 7 days a week and I have no problem with it (and I was getting straight pay, not time-and-a-half for OT). I would have a problem not getting paid in full for all my time worked.

        And if I was “expected” to work 12 hours a day, but only paid for 10, and docked on reviews for not doing so, I would be in search of a new job.

    3. Betsy*

      I’m going to add to the “this sounds awful” crowd with the fact that the average person who works 60 hours in a week actually accomplishes less in ALL 60 HOURS than a person who works a 40-hour week accomplishes in only 2/3 on the time. Your per-hour productivity suffers badly enough that even the extra time can’t compensate.

      Sustained long work-weeks aren’t only bad for the employee; they’re bad for the company, and policies that judge people based on when their butt is in the chair are really short-sighted.

      1. Jake*

        You are 100% correct in your assessment on productivity. We are less productive while working that schedule, but we are also a support function. We are to support the field, so if they are working, we need to be there to produce construction aid sketches, answer questions, etc. During this type of work schedule our job becomes about 60% about just supporting the field and 40% actually being productive.

        1. Rayner*

          If you are unproductive during this time, why are you working that number of hours?

          It’s backwards.

          “I am not producing quality work during this time, so I must extend the amount of time I am being unproductive for?”

          You would do far better cutting the number of staff during that time for the same number of hours, or reducing your hours.

          Just because it’s ‘the way it’s done’, doesn’t mean it’s the most productive.

            1. Kat*

              Precisely. I am a manager on a construction site, and we are the same. I’m expected to provide coverage from at least 6:45am to about 5:30pm on weekdays, but that doesn’t mean I’ll be flat out busy the whole time.

              None of the managers get OT, but our pay is significantly higher than engineers working in the same field who have 40 hour weeks (designers, for example).

    4. Vicki*

      I don’t see anything in letter #1 about overtime. The employee is on site and yet being told her “attendance” is poor. You’re either present or not.

      I also don’t understand how her second-level (boss’s boss) comes into this. Does he count noses on everyone waking past his office (on a differentfloor??) Doesn’t he have his own work to do?

  2. Cassie*

    #1: I wish companies would have guidelines for performance evaluations, sort of like rubrics that college English courses have. State what the categories really mean, like “communication” means conveying the relevant/correct information in an appropriate tone, not like “writes grammatically correct sentences” which obviously plays a part in communication, but is not the end all, be all.

    I mean, at my workplace, the manager’s definition of “teamwork” is basically “attends social events” – it would be good (although silly) for all of us to know that if we want to get high marks on “teamwork”, that’s what we need to do.

    1. Del*

      My job actually does this, and it is super, super helpful! The categories on our performance reviews and personal evaluations are broken down so that you get a really detailed explanation of exactly what each category means. So #1 we have a very clear sense of what we need to do to score well in a category, and #2 because those are codified it really cuts down on bosses being able to pull stuff like what you describe; if my boss tried to tell me that my teamwork was poor because I didn’t teamwork in a specific way, I could push back and point out all the other things I do that line up with the “works well with others” part of the rubric.

  3. Laura*

    4 – What a bunch of BS. I hate companies that can’t treat adults like adults. Gee whiz, manager – I’ve been working 10 hour days, and now I need to come in 2 hours late tomorrow… and what?!?!? I have to use my PTO? **shaking head** Why can’t these moronic companies come up with some new policy that ALLOWS employees to come in A FEW hours late maybe like 8 times a year? Would it be so difficult, Corp America?

    1. Zahra*

      If I understand correctly, if you don’t have any PTO left and you need to take a partial day off, they have to pay you the full week anyway. So what’s the point of docking your PTO for partial days? Just so people don’t have as many if they get really sick with the flu?

      1. fposte*

        The docking rules are a little more complicated than that, and they include full day as well as partial day. Here’s an overview:

        http://www.hrmorning.com/docking-pay-exempt-employees/

        One reason it can matter is that sick days/PTO left unused can be a factor in retirement or separation–some employers pay employees for unused sick leave, and I, for instance, can factor them into my retirement eligibility date.

    2. Eric*

      To me, this is what sick leave is there for (particularly when it is separate from vacation). It is there to take when you will not be in the office for medical reasons. I’m not seeing why this is a huge deal.

      1. Kimberlee, esq*

        I agree.

        ‘Why can’t these moronic companies come up with some new policy that ALLOWS employees to come in a FEW hours late maybe 8 times a year?’

        They do, it’s called the paid leave policy you’re complaining about! While I get that companies are not all as flexible with this as they could be, the existence of paid time off is a huge adjustment in the right direction.

        1. dustycrown*

          But the problem for exempt employees is that it only works ONE WAY. I can deduct the two hours that I’m gone for an appointment, but I can’t add back the two hours that I work late, or the lunch hour I didn’t get to take, or the phone calls I get at home…you get the idea. So yeah, it seems extra nitpicky and unreasonable to keep track of the hours I’m out but disregard the extra time I work.

    3. Kat*

      Seriously. At my old job as a store manager at a very large retail corporation, our PTO had to be taken in 4 or 8 hour chunks. So if you worked more than 40 hours a week you got paid for 40, even though the store payroll was held accountable for all your hours, even though anything over 40 was unpaid. But if you were even a minute under 40 hours, say goodbye to a half day of your PTO. Nothing like getting a phone call getting in trouble because you worked 39.97 hours the previous week and having to give up 4 hours of PTO time.
      Plus it encouraged people working sick- like if you had to open and were really ill, why would you go home before 4 hours had passed because having to take a full 8 hours of PTO would make the 3 hours or whatever that you had worked become unpaid time.

        1. Laufey*

          Yeah, you should have been paid for everything you worked, even if it was over forty hours. The crappy PTO system is a crappy PTO system, but they need to pay you for what you were there and working for.

            1. E*

              I would conjecture that if Kat is so beholden to a time clock that leaving .03 hours early gets her docked 4 hours of PTO, that she is probably misclassified as overtime exempt. Most exemptions require that the employee have at least some flexibility/discretion in performing her or his work duties.

              1. Kat*

                One of the many reasons it is my ex-job. I found that in many retail jobs, by the time you are exempt you don’t have to clock in and out anymore. As a retail manager at that level you’re always working anyway between trying to get scheduling and paperwork done and getting phone calls at home. I think this particular company doesn’t have a whole lot of trust and a huge number of locations, so the time clock is a way of maintaining control.

    4. Vicki*

      At one company where I worked, HR had to explain to managers that no, they were not permitted to dock PTO in increments of less than 4 hours. Not 1 or 2, not 5. It was 4 if you missed half a day, 8 if you were out a whole day.

      And unless people were required to use a time clock, managers were told that they were NOT permitted to watch the clock for the employee of wonder who was at their desk when or how long.

  4. Chris*

    For #2 it may not be a matter of her not knowing how to count.
    A place I worked at awhile back implemented a computer scheduling program, so that every week the computer would spit out schedules that were awful (too many hours/not enough/3 hour lunch breaks) Our manager would have to sit down, and manually adjust everything, and being human, would occasionally miss some issue shifts.

    And if it is her, I am sorry. I worked through college and when I hired in, asked to only work 24 hours max so I could do my coursework. That lasted a week, after which he scheduled me 32-40 hours. And every time I would have to go back and tell him to drop my hours. Some people are truly clueless when they schedule. The only thing you can do is keep reminding her politely.

    1. Anonymous*

      The sucky part is, there’s always someone on the flip side who wants those hours, doesn’t get them, and stares at the schedule wondering why the hell Jane is getting them when she doesn’t even want them.

    2. Eve*

      That happened to me as a student!

      Except when I pointed it out, I was told that I marked that time as available, so I had to work. Arguing that I also marked the bubbles for part time and less than 25 hrs was ineffective. After 3 months being forbidden to trade shifts off and working ALMOST full time, I quit!

  5. S. Miller*

    #4 – This position is different than other people taking partial days off. A nurse practitioner is customer facing. If a nurse practitioner is not around, either someone else has to cover the patients or the patients have to be canceled and rescheduled.

    It is easier to find someone to cover a person for a whole day than it is to find someone to cover for a few hours so being gone for a few hours can be a greater inconvenience than being gone a whole day.

    It also allows someone to spread their time off over a much longer period so there are more days that the rest of the staff is inconvenienced if you are out and no one is covering for you.

    If your patients are cancelled, someone might see that as costing the company money or appearing unreliable to all the people who had their appointments canceled.

    1. Anonagain*

      This exactly. In a customer facing role, taking partial days off can be problematic. We have one person on our team who just has ISSUES. Health issues, family issues, you name it and if they don’t have it now, they will tomorrow. Their life is one long melodrama, and our workplace is their personal stage. They were given a special early shift, starting an hour before regular office hours. But an average of two days a week, they also like to leave early. We are required to use PTO in 4 hour increments, so this person prefers to “make up” the time by “working” during lunch, when the doors are locked and the phones turned off. However, during the time they are at work, they are frequently nowhere to be found! This person is our primary receptionist, so when they are gone, on the clock or off, a coworker has to cover for them. And oh, did I mention? No notice. The coworker who has to cover is me, so believe me when I tell you that this can cause BIG PROBLEMS. And big resentment. I am all for treating people like adults. But some of them … just aren’t.

      1. Kat*

        This kind of sounds like a performance issue, not an attendance issue. Treating everyone like children with regards to attendance is not making this person perform any better.

      2. Kimberlee, Esq.*

        I like your phrasing, and I have to say I agree. I really like policies that treat people like adults, but there are two things required for that to work:

        1. Employees that act like adults, and
        2. Managers that are willing and able to enforce consequences for childlike behavior.

        In my experience, there is almost always at least one person who will abuse policies, no matter how generous. Some places have a “take the time you need, when you need it, no worries” policy, and while I would love that, there is a huge chance that someone will abuse that policy. But it can be very hard to discipline that, because if you have a generous policy, you can have significant abuse that isn’t technically a violation. It takes a skilled manager, and if you don’t happen to have that, then you have to either re-write your policy or just be cool with the abuse.

        I suspect many company policies start out generous, and then are contracted. Oftentimes badly, and oftentimes only because they’re not dealing with the real issues. But I’m guessing there’s some level of creep along those to lines to crappier policies.

  6. Elysian*

    #4 – My company does this too. It made me very sad when I first realized this was how we operated. I regularly work 50 hour weeks, so when I mentioned I had to take a long lunch for a doctor’s appointment, and they told me they would dock me two hours of sick leave, I was very disappointed. I tried to argue “what if I make up the time later” (aka – I’m going to come in early and stay late to get my work done either way) and they said no. I have a non-client facing office job. So, I’m right there with you. This is a dumb policy.

  7. Jen*

    #5 – it’s a losing battle. I’m sorry you’re going through this. I went through a similar thing – ate lunch frequently with two women and they would just pick at me the whole time, what I ate, what I said, non-stop picking. So I stopped eating with them and then was on the outs in a major way. Some people are terrible and you just can’t change them.

    1. Arbynka*

      Sadly, some people never mature past the high school level :(

      OP did the right thing separating herself from that group. I know it can be tough but as Alison said, I believe the best way to handle this is to ignore them and keep it professional.

    2. Trillian*

      Overhearing those comments would merely have me thinking (a) what unpleasant people and (b) the OP was smart to keep them out of his/her business.

    3. holly*

      if i was a client/other coworker and overhead people talking about not being able to see someone’s FB photos, i’d think “big deal.” that’s all. who the F cares?

  8. QualityControlFreak*

    #1 – I agree completely with AAM’s response. Attendance is documented and you can point this out, but doing so could have negative consequences. It sounded to me like what your boss is trying to tell you (albeit in a confusing and inept fashion) is that s/he would like you to try to be more collaborative with your team, and more visible to the next level of supervision.

    You might, just might, want to ask your boss for clarification on what specifically you need to improve on and ask if your review could be reworded to reflect that. But you risk being perceived by upper management as a troublemaker, or high maintenance (however unfair that may be), and your performance review turning into more of a PIP.

    Sorry, it’s unfair and it bites, but you can take what information you have been given and try to make the best use of it that you can. That could mean anything from committing to yourself to improve on A, B and C to deciding that this employer and/or this role are really not for you in the long term.

    Good luck, OP #1; I feel for you.

    1. Anon*

      Totally agree with QualityControlFreak and RuffingIt for #1. I was specifically told by my manager at my last job that I couldn’t just sit there and work all day, that I needed to walk around and talk to people. WTF? Isn’t the problem in our country that people socialize TOO much at work and aren’t productive enough?

      I’m not antisocial, but the work doesn’t go away while I’m chit-chatting, so that would mean I’d have to work even later or work more at night from home. I left voluntarily.

  9. Ruffingit*

    #1 is so incredibly stupid, it’s mind boggling. Basically what the boss is saying is this: “It’s more important to me that you be seen than that you’re doing the work we pay you for. So, when you’re in the office, you need to use time that you could be working and making money and instead walk around so I can see you.” WTF?? Seriously, I don’t think the boss even realizes this is what he’s asking. It’s just so, so incredibly stupid.

    1. some1*

      I remember years ago when I was a receptionist, I started at 8:15 but the office “opened” at 8 so a co-worker covered the front desk every morning from 8-8:15.

      One morning, I came in (on time) and said co-worker was chatting with some other co-workers in the conference room located right behind my desk and didn’t see me come in. The co-worker came out after I’d been there 8-10 min and greeted me with, “Hello, Some1”. Our boss, who was down the hall, tried to write me up for being late because she assumed I must have arrived when the co-worker greeted me.

  10. ANONYMOUS*

    OP #1, I completely understand your frustration! 2 years ago, my boss’s boss told my boss that I was having attendance issues (my boss worked from home 3 days/week). Luckily for me, my boss was awesome and just laughed it off.

    My boss’s boss travels constantly and when she is in the office, we work very different hours. She will generally work from 7-4 and I typically work from 9:30-6 with a 30 minute lunch (my boss drives 2 hours to get to the office and often doesn’t arrive until 10). Also, my office is on the 2nd floor, while hers is on the first. I don’t have to pass anyone’s office–just the reception area and the break room–to get to my own. Some days, I don’t see anyone else at all except when running downstairs to get coffee, use the printer, or eat lunch.

    Anyway, for me it really was all about perception. Once the “problem” was brought to my attention, I made it a point to either walk past her office or send some sort of relevant email shortly after arriving and to leave some sort of proof on my way out (a voicemail to her from my office phone, an email, making a point to say good night to anyone else left in the office, etc).

    After a few months, she apparently realized that she had been mistaken and I haven’t heard a peep since.

    1. Ann Furthermore*

      That’s the best way to handle stuff like that. It’s annoying that you have to take the time to do it, but it’s an effective approach.

    2. Judy*

      This is similar to what I was going to post. I haven’t had this issue, but someone who sat in my area a few years ago was having a similar problem. The manager didn’t get in until 8:30, when published office hours started at 7:30. This person said he got to work at 6:45, and he was pretty much in when I arrived between 7:10 and 7:20 every day. He started making sure that he published things or returned emails from his boss first thing every morning, and it all was handled. (It didn’t really seem to matter that there should have been records from the keycard swipe every morning to show when he got there.)

  11. FD*

    OP #2, are you in the kind of job where people often get sent home early if it isn’t too busy? If so, they might be scheduling you for longer with the intention of sending you home early some days.

  12. Sarah*

    I might be paranoid, but #1 sounds like rigging the numbers to me. Perhaps raises are mandated as per company policy based on performance reviews?

  13. Ann Furthermore*

    #1 – This is so frustrating and disheartening. I’ve had untrue things put into my performance evaluation, and even though I made a pretty big stink about it, nobody would do anything.

    All you can do is focus on the present and the future. Like Alison said, if you can figure out why your boss’s boss has the idea that you have an attendance issue. If you work from home that could be part of the reason. My company has a pretty flexible work from home policy, but some managers still have the idea that if you’re not in the office at your desk, then you’re not really working. My boss is very good about this kind of thing, but even so when I work from home I always make sure to copy her on any emails she needs to see, make sure I answer her IM’s right away, and so on.

    #4 – This would drive me nuts. If you’re exempt you shouldn’t have to do stuff like this. You’re an adult and should be trusted to manage your own workload and meet your deadlines. If you don’t, then that’s when your boss should address it with you. I don’t get why some managers are intent on treating their direct reports like children. My philosophy is to treat people like grown-ups until they give me a reason not to.

    I do leave early or in the middle of the day to do things like go to a doctor’s appointment, run errands, or pick up my daughter. But when deadlines are looming I’m putting in plenty of extra hours so over time things all work out — usually to the company’s advantage because the additional hours I work more than offset the time I take to do personal stuff. In general the rule of thumb is that if something takes more than 4 hours, you use a half day of PTO. If it doesn’t, you don’t have to worry about it.

  14. Rayner*

    #1 – I’m sorry. Your boss – or your boss’s boss is an absolute fool. If he had a with your attendence, it should done as part of performance.

    The discussion should be like this, “Jenny, part of your work is X, and since you started doing Y, this part has not been done. I’ve noticed that you’re often in your office when you should be collaborating with B department. This is how I want you to improve …”

    Not, “Jenny, I didn’t see you on the floor in the morning, three times this week. I’m not feeling your presence even though I’m not everywhere at once, and can’t be sure that you aren’t actually doing work during this time. Also, your work hasn’t suffered, and nobody else has complained. I hired you to do a job, damnit, but you should do other things too!”

    Honestly, I’d push back if this performance review is important – if it affects raises or your status within the company, it’s important to go back and prove to your boss that actually, it’s not fair that you’re being penalised for something that isn’t true.

    I wouldn’t be aggressive, but I’d just say, “[manager], I’m concerned about this review. I’ve checked how often I took leave and sick days, and this is the result. I don’t have poor attendance at all, which means this review is wrong and it will affect me badly.”

    I suppose, if you feel it’s because of a legal issue- perhaps, other people who use more days off and their sick days are all men or a different race or not pregnant, and you feel treated differently, it would be a very important element to consider too.

  15. Blue Dog*

    #3 – This is not that uncommon. Besides truly seasonal positions, MOST places don’t hire during the holidays.

    Work places are notoriously unproductive after the holidays. People are distracted. There are a lot of parties and year end festivities. People want extra time off. This is going to be particularly true this year when Christmas and New Years both fall directly in the middle of the week. (How much work do you think will get done the two days before Christmas? Or the two days after?)

    In addition to not being able to get decision makers ready, they probably don’t want to hire anyone who will also not be productive at the end of the year. Better to wait until January 1 and everyone can hit the ground running at the same time.

  16. Kimberlee, Esq.*

    Regarding #1, I wonder if the boss’ boss had another attendance-related issue that wasn’t straight up attendance. For instance, if you took only one sick day al year, but it happened to be during the busiest day of the year, or if you left a giant project in a lurch, or if you happened to not call in with sufficient notice, etc. Could even be that he happened to see OP leave 10 minutes early one day and wanted him knocked on attendance for that.

    But given that the boss’ boss took a special note of OP and specifically requested that attendance (which as we’ve all noted is one of the more objective measures of performance) be the score knocked suggest to me that there was indeed a specific incident that the boss’ boss wanted reflected in the score.

  17. Lisa*

    #1 – I was also given a review that detailed me focusing on things that do not contribute to the ROI of a client. The exact example given was for something that I haven’t touched in years. An annual event that I set up content for that is updated by the client each year – they get a boost in attendees by following the content structure I set up years ago. I argued with my director about it, but the reality is the owner has this perception, and even though I’ve already told him that I haven’t touched that part of the account in years. I had a perfect review by my director, and the boss put all the things that she said was great as negatives and nitpicked on this event thing that wasn’t relevant to the past year at all. A near perfect review, was given the once over by the boss you believes that you can’t be perfect and must give constructive criticism (lies or bring up things others do as a point so you can’t possible get the max raise). “we all must strive to …” when my director says I already do that.

    Your boss who said this, isn’t going to change. Being on the floor isn’t going to help unless that person sees you. IE – Find another job, since you can’t convince him/her with actual numbers and its a losing battle. Or start scheduling walk-throughs that involve going to that person’s office to check in / ask questions on things you already know the answer to. The boss wants to feel like they are needed and when you don’t need them, they ‘find’ things to complain about.

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