Appraisal Time

Place de la Renaissance  Bois Colombes, Paris    04 May 2010     09:20 PM     Tuesday

 

It's performance appraisal time. It's the time when we apprehensively wait for a communication from our managers, who we normally desire to ignore rest of the whole year. But now, we all wait for that special moment to see that special e-mail in our inbox for which we toil all year long. All kinds of rumours and gossips spread like wild fire but burn out quickly. Lunch, tea and snack breaks are used to their utmost potential by chatting incessantly about all sorts of things - promotions, salary hikes, ratings, politics, managers, work culture, etc. Some querulous individuals don't miss out this opportunity to start whining over their luck :

" Yaar meri to kismat hi kharab hai, is baar to promotion pakki thi, aur saala isi baar recession aa gaya ! "
 

" Nai yaar, meri to recommendation 6 maheene pehle hi chali gai thi (as if he himself forwarded his recommendation), but last moment mein project change ki wajah se kat gaya mera ! "

Some guys who are desperately expecting the role enhancement, but are low in confidence, would intentionally embark this conversation to get the desired assurance and confidence from the listeners in this way:

" Jo bhi ho yaar lekin, kisi aur ki ho na ho (yeah he's pointing to himself, poor him), is baar Nayar ki pakki hogi ! " , hoping in his heart that the others would counter argue by saying :

" Are nahi yaar, tere bhi poore chances hain. Agar Nayar ki hui, to teri to usse pehle hogi " - and he's relaxed big time, as if he's already got the promotion letter. Yeah, it really feels good if people around you keep assuring that you are the one, a definite one this year... And you need to get this assurance again and again and that too quite often.

The ones who are least active in this conversation have been either recently promoted, recently joined or recently resigned. But nevertheless, they love it. Everyone loves it. After all, this can either stimulate or sedate your complacency towards your career growth. You look at your peers, your supervisors and even your subordinates. And you rightly so, because you get the opportunity to paint this career graph on a canvas called life against age, experience and money. Everyone gets distinct graphs with different shapes, and everyone takes it differently. It's a matter of pride and joy for many, whereas sorrow and disgust for the rest. But then, you can always paint it better the next year. You always have that power. That luck !

And so may you get the best of that luck this year. And so do I :)

Ta

Gaurav Gupta