Before you meet with your employees for their year-end assessments, re- view your documentation on each of your employees. You don’t want to commit either of two errors that many managers make. They either assess an employee as outstanding because of one very impressive trait or accomplishment, on the assumption that other accomplishments were equally impressive, or they become very critical of the employee because of a recent incident, forgetting all those past incidents in which the same employee did well.
In the latter situation, the employee can do nothing to convince the manager that he or she is a good worker. Maybe the employee began the year poorly and then turned the performance around, but the supervisor lets the employee’s early mistakes override the significant improvement.
A good employee who associates with mediocre or average employees may also never be rated above average due to those friendships. Despite differences in the level of their performances, the manager rates the employee the same as the employee’s buddies.