Funny Performance Reviews

Feb 5

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After we published the article on the crazy things people have seen on a performance review, readers shared their own experiences with crazy reviews. Some of them are funny, some are crazy. Others were unprofessional, illogical, or cringe-worthy.

In short they were too good to not share. May it serve as a reminder of what NOT to do at the performance review.

Bryan Stoddard, Homewares Insider

Back when I was starting, I loved to wear digital watches. Specifically simple black Casios that are now once again becoming popular. For some unknown reason, this has been noted as a negative trait. If I remember correctly, the employer demanded we use analog watches and every time he would see a digital watch he would start muttering. It was simply strange and I can't find a good reason for his hate of digital watches to this day.

Cassy Aite, Hoppier

The craziest thing I’ve read on a performance review was: Doesn’t want to participate in company foosball games. Not a team player - not recommended for promotion.

This person was actually one of the top performers in our development team. He is an introvert and mostly kept to himself and that’s what management didn’t like. So, while we were playing foosball, he was creating new features for an app we worked on. This performance review almost got him fired because his personality wasn’t an ideal match for the company culture. It’s crazy because none of his actual capabilities actually mattered.

Bina Patel, Conflict Resolution Practices

In my years as a consultant in organizational health and culture, I have heard the following:

I have to rate you so I will give you a 3.8 out of 5, which translates to a 4 for all that you have done. I know you have saved the company over $28M in labor lawsuits, but am not quite sure what you do. Can you write a standard operating policy (SOP) on how to triage emotions? I can probably bump up the rating if you can show me how to practically triage emotions.
The way you dress is very old. You are clearly too old to be here and unable to function in your job. I know that you have trained our special ops team, but the way you look is not good up to our standards.
You write like a third grader.
You are frankly unfit, physically to be on this job [in reference to a job that requires sitting all day and the individual was overweight].
Although we recognize you are a master politician and can talk your way out of anything work related, with absolutely no substance. We can rate you exceeding expectations on communication and collaboration.

Jeremy Harrison, Hustle Life

Here's the craziest thing I've seen on a performance review: My boss told me that I wouldn't get any increase or bonus because I only scored a 3. I asked how I could get the 5, and she said I needed to exceed the standards. When I asked what those standards were, she said she hasn't set the standards yet, and there was no way to gauge if I exceeded the status quo; thus, she gave me the average score of 3. Needless to say, I didn't wait for the next performance appraisal!

Aqsa Tabassam, Brandnic

A manager wrote to my friend, “We have recognized your abilities; you could be a good fictional writer. We came to know about your hidden strength after reading your repeated leave applications in the past six months.”

Mike Collins, DadSense

Here's the craziest thing I've seen on a performance review: A few years ago I had just taken on a new management role with a large corporation and one disgruntled employee used his performance review to trash the entire organization and to question the leadership of both my new boss and the manager I had replaced. The whole review was entirely inappropriate and needless to say he was not satisfied with his merit increase.

Cindy Lo, Fit Small Business

I’ve got two to share:

“He is doing a great job and I can see him growing here. However, I may have to dock points because [employee favorite sport's team] sucks and [rival sport's team] rules! J/K.”

"She's really shy and I don't think she will be a good fit here. We were both getting coffee in the kitchen, and she looked at me, put her head down and swerved comically to get out of the kitchen so she wouldn't have to say hello. We sit right next to each other and she reports to me."

Dan Lysogorsky , IPL Management LLC

Here's the craziest thing I've seen on a performance review in my past, that there was too much initiative and responsibility taken and does not share the work load with others in order to complete tasks for the company. Aside the fact that all work is done in a satisfactory manner, leadership skills are taken too seriously and always increases the sole workload unnecessarily resulting with other team members with less projects.

Luka Arežina, DataProt

I'd be happy to comment on my bizarre experience working at a call center in London. It was one of my first jobs out of college and I decided to try my luck in the UK job market.

So I ended up in a call-center owned by this Indian guy, and I got hired on the spot as I naively assumed the job was awesome. There were commission bonuses, free coffee on the company tab from the cafe across the street and there was even a smoking lounge in the building!As the months passed, there were performance reviews, and here is where it got weird. We would discuss raises with the boss during our one on one performance reviews, but our boss would say tell me that raises are only for the best performing and cost-efficient employees. So I asked, what exactly do I need to do for a raise?To which he smiled and pulled out his tablet and showed me some shoddily put together pie chart accompanied by a spreadsheet. Look, he told me, based on the data here, you consume 1.5x more coffee than most of our employees and you smoke about 5 cigarettes during your 8-hour shift. So that means you aren't working for 40 minutes per day if you take a 5-minute smoke break each time? Do you see?I did argue my case for my work performance and sales quotas achieved over the months and so on, but he proceeded to calculate exactly how much it "cost him" to keep me there and that he was doing me a great favor allowing me to work for him. Of course, by this point I had enough of working in the call-center industry, and ended up quitting a few months later, never to return!In the end, I was paid fairly and there were no deductions to my paycheck in lieu of my coffee habit at work, which of course is presented as a "perk" when they hire you. So all ended well, but it just showed me that a performance review can go beyond just actual "work performance" and include whatever the manager has in mind.