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I do think asking for reviews is a bit intrusive, and to some degree, reviews do/could show inside information (some of mine are result oriented based on my goals, so projects and details are listed). So in this sense, I am concerned a bit.
However, if I do not provide them, and other people do, then I am guessing that I would be at a disadvantage, so I will most likely bring them with me and take it from there. I am very interested in this job.
Here's another question, my evaluation results are all meets expectations level, with a few catagories on each evaluation exceeding, do my reviews still help?
Also, as a few people mentioned, I do not think that evaluations always show a true picture of the person. Sometimes there is an agenda or a certain number of people have to fit into a certain amount of catagories (one company could only have a few people at the top rating, and a few people had to be at the bottom, with the majority rating as meeting expectations...doing job and doing it well).
Any other thoughts? Thanks!
Any "meets expectations" rating is a good rating. When someone is hired, that is what it is hoped that they will do.
I realize many evaluations will not give a complete picture of the prospective employee. It is just one more piece of the puzzle. But if the interviewee comes across as prepared and qualified, appears to have good inter-personal skills, asks relevant questions, has done his or her homework and is knowledgable about the employer, has good references, and also has a meets standards evaluation from a prior employer, then that person has an excellent chance of receiving an offer.
if you don't and other do your like won't get the job. most employers are reluctant to give any information like this so the new employer ask you to.Many thou will ask for a recommendation but when its negative they usually refuse anything;which isn't good etiher.You have to weight the good with the so-so most times.
Any "meets expectations" rating is a good rating. When someone is hired, that is what it is hoped that they will do.
I realize many evaluations will not give a complete picture of the prospective employee. It is just one more piece of the puzzle. But if the interviewee comes across as prepared and qualified, appears to have good inter-personal skills, asks relevant questions, has done his or her homework and is knowledgable about the employer, has good references, and also has a meets standards evaluation from a prior employer, then that person has an excellent chance of receiving an offer.
That makes me feel a lot better, thanks! I am going to copy them and bring them. Having most of my reviews going back over 10 years probably makes me look organized if nothing else.....
That makes me feel a lot better, thanks! I am going to copy them and bring them. Having most of my reviews going back over 10 years probably makes me look organized if nothing else.....
Or like someone who accumulates a lot of clutter.
Not trying to be rude by any means, but I'm just the opposite. I don't keep stup like that. Even my tax records (including for a small business) fit neatly in a manila envelope every year, and get shredded after seven years.
I think there's a happy medium, and I don't think I'd offer 10 years worth of reviews. Three or four would be as far back as I'd go. But then again I don't have those. The last company I worked for didn't have a formal review process, you just met with your boss each year and were verballly given a review and you either got a raise or you didn't. The company before that it was all done on the computer and considered proprietary, you couldn't print it.
What I do have are letters of recommendation from previous employers, and I'd be happy to offer those in place.
Not trying to be rude by any means, but I'm just the opposite. I don't keep stup like that. Even my tax records (including for a small business) fit neatly in a manila envelope every year, and get shredded after seven years.
I think there's a happy medium, and I don't think I'd offer 10 years worth of reviews. Three or four would be as far back as I'd go. But then again I don't have those. The last company I worked for didn't have a formal review process, you just met with your boss each year and were verballly given a review and you either got a raise or you didn't. The company before that it was all done on the computer and considered proprietary, you couldn't print it.
What I do have are letters of recommendation from previous employers, and I'd be happy to offer those in place.
Here is my reasoning for bringing all of my reviews. Let me know if you still think it is a bad idea.
My oldest review is one of the best and most relevant reviews I have, and it is the only one I saved from that company (the review has many comments about how well I worked with customers and the job I am applying for requires a great deal of customer contact).
My next five reviews are consecutive reviews from one company. I tried to pick out a few, however, the first few are glowing reviews that also talk about how much I stil need to learn, and the last few say a lot about how much I learned, but I was not sure they had the same glowing tone to them.
My last set are from my most recent job and they are all over the place in terms of how they rate people, the timing, and the catagories. They are also less understandable (we wrote our goals and then we were rating with respect to those goals) and less relevant (did not work with customers too often).
Also, the job is a documentation (and customer!) type job, so I am not worried that they will look at my saving them as clutter. I do not have many written reviews, but I am planning to bring a copy of my linkedin reviews and also "good-job" type emails I saved along the way.
This may come out wrong and it is not intentional. But if your absolute best reviews are from 5+ years ago, I would not bring those.
Because even though I can't tell how awesome or not awesome of an employee you are, I would look at your first reviews and then the latter and think-- hmm so why didn't this employee maintain this same kind of performance over the years?
I would pick reviews from the previous 18 months or something-- I think bringing in 10 years seems like overkill and honestly for most people a review from 10 years ago would not be relevant (heck my reviews from 2004 have nothing much to do with my current role, skills, performance currently).
This may come out wrong and it is not intentional. But if your absolute best reviews are from 5+ years ago, I would not bring those.
Because even though I can't tell how awesome or not awesome of an employee you are, I would look at your first reviews and then the latter and think-- hmm so why didn't this employee maintain this same kind of performance over the years?
I would pick reviews from the previous 18 months or something-- I think bringing in 10 years seems like overkill and honestly for most people a review from 10 years ago would not be relevant (heck my reviews from 2004 have nothing much to do with my current role, skills, performance currently).
My reviews are about the same in terms of the ratings (most were meets expectations with one or two exceeding). However, the older reviews are more relevant to the position, have more useful comments, and are a more standard type of review than my more recent reviews.
I am going to copy all of them, go through them more closely, and go from there. I may bring them all to the interview and see how many they want (and I will have one from each company pre-selected in case they want one of each).
What do you do if your employer doesn't conduct written evaluations? I suspect there are more that don't than do.
Quote:
Originally Posted by janetvj
I'm curious as to why anyone would think it unusual or strange that a prospective employer would want to use whatever resources are available to make sure that they hire the right person for the job.
I'm curious as to why anyone would think it's a good idea to violate confidentiality.
What do you do if your employer doesn't conduct written evaluations? I suspect there are more that don't than do.
I'm curious as to why anyone would think it's a good idea to violate confidentiality.
Then just say you do not receive written evaluations, but would be happy to provide professional references.
And as far as any violation of confidentiality, I guess it depends on the terms of your contract with your employer. As I said earlier, I can only go by personal experience with my employer, and the written evaluations are the property of the employee, who is free to share them with whomever they choose. The employer, however, may only release them with written permission from the employee. If the terms of your contract with your employer are different, then so be it.
As an employer, I would still request them. If providing them violated confidentiality, the interviewee would certainly be able to use that as a legitimate reason to not comply with that request.
What do you do if your employer doesn't conduct written evaluations? I suspect there are more that don't than do.
I'm curious as to why anyone would think it's a good idea to violate confidentiality.
"violate confidentiality" would be if they went ahead and did something without your permission. They're simply asking for it - and if you agree to it, that info is no longer confidential to them (they would still need to protect it though).
The bottom line is that you are trying to sell your services to a potential client. They're basically asking for indicators of previous performance to make a decision. This is no different from a portfolio in the design field, or pictures/testimonials of previous work done by contractors. They have the right to ask, and you have the right to decline.
Having said that - I'd decline unless it becomes the norm, and I'm finding myself being overlooked because I don't offer it. Also, I'm not sure why that would hold any more weight than a reference. Yes, references are "loaded" in that you would only give out good ones. But performance reviews are just as easy to "filter" or even modify - and worse yet, its not verifiable. Its not like you can call the former employer and say "hey, can you verify that you gave so and so a "exceed in all" on their last review?"
And as a hiring manager - I wouldn't put too much emphasis on that if someone offered it. The environment they worked in and the colleagues they worked with can be vastly different then the one they're applying for. Not to mention that a large % of a review is typically tied to the company's "core values"... and most of them are pretty lame - Integrity, honesty, customer service etc... as if that's actually something you need to emphasize?
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