Fact: Successful Med Device And Pharma Stars Conduct Their Own Performance Reviews

As the year passes its halfway mark, many pharma and medical device professionals will be anticipating their mid-year performance review. 

To make the right impression for your review, it’s important to assess your career progress so far this year, measuring how you’ve performed against your manager’s targets, as well as your own goals.  

By conducting a self-assessment before a performance review, you’re not only better placed to explain any obstacles you’ve faced or justify a promotion, but you’re also marking yourself out as someone who is in control of their results, and their career.  

What form should a self-assessment take? 

You may want to prepare a written self-assessment to produce at the performance review or simply run through these steps beforehand, so you are fully prepared for the discussion. 

If you are planning to give your self-assessment to your manager, make sure the language is professional, and you come across as positive and self-aware, as this document could become part of your permanent employee file.  

Questions to ask yourself during self-assessment 

1.  How am I performing against my role description? 

When settling into a new job, we tend to favour those tasks and responsibilities that we’re good at or enjoy, and often neglect to put the same effort into other less enjoyable tasks. Which is why it’s extremely-important to regularly go back to your original job description, and remind yourself of the range of tasks and expectations that come under your role.  

Are there aspects of your role that have fallen by the wayside?  Your manager will be assessing your performance against your job description, so you should be doing this before the review, so you’re not caught unawares about things you’re slipping on, and you can also discuss any added responsibilities that have been added since you joined. 

2. What are the gaps in my skillset, and what can I do to close them? 

The above exercise will have probably highlighted some skills that you’re expected to have, but don’t, or don’t have to the required level. What can you do in the lead-up to the performance review to address that, so you can make it clear to the manager that you’re taking steps to improve? 

3. Which tasks or projects have I excelled at? 

Our brains have a natural negativity bias, so we’re much more likely to remember our failures than successes. Which is why it’s a good practice to keep a track of your work successes along the way, particularly if you’ve got big goals or are hoping for a promotion or raise. If you’ve forgotten some of the smaller wins you’ve had, refresh your memory by going back over your calendar and emails.   

4. Which of these successes impact on the company’s bottom line and goals? 

Once you’ve compiled your list of successes, you need to be strategic about selecting and promoting the ones that deliver the most benefit to the team or company goals.  

Whether that’s an obvious one like a pharma salesperson increasing market share, or a scientist streamlining processes to bring a project in on time, think about what will impress the manager most. Maybe you shouldered extra responsibility when someone was ill, so a project didn’t fall behind?  

5. What feedback can I get from co-workers? 

This is an opportunity to request honest, constructive feedback from your colleagues. Seek out those whose judgement you trust and who you believe will be honest, and ask them for a balanced review of where they think your strengths and weaknesses lie. 

6. How am I performing against my objectives and goals? 

Hopefully, back in January, you wrote down your career goals for the year. Now’s the time to break that list back out and assess your progress, analysing where you’ve fallen behind, what’s been accomplished, and which unexpected obstacles have got in your way. 

7. What are my goals for the rest of the year? 

Then write a new, detailed 6 month plan to take you through to the end of 2018. What is possible in the time that remains? Apply what you learnt from the first 6 months to your fresh plan, factoring in different eventualities and leaving flexibility to amend the plan where needed.  

We recommend that your big goals are broken down into the smallest constituent parts, with deadlines and rewards along the way so you keep on track.  

8. What would help me become better at my job? What would I like to learn? 

Here’s where you consider what the manager could do to make you more effective in your role, whether that’s streamlining certain processes, sending you on a research conference, or giving you extra coaching on sales techniques.   

Find some concrete examples of where your work has been held up by inefficiency or you feel you haven’t performed as well as you could have due to a lack of training. Remember, this is not a blame game, merely a polite request for further assistance to allow you to do a better job. Frame your request in a way where the benefit to the company is clear.  

A self-assessment isn’t just an effective way to prepare for a performance review, or even impress your boss. It’s also a great way to audit how far you’ve come along on any goals you’ve set for this year and strategise any adjustments you might need to make to finish the last  months of 2018 strongly.  

Thanks, 

Chris 

About Kinetic 

Kinetic pride ourselves on being the leading regional experts in the full range of recruitment solutions for the Pharmaceutical and Medical Devices industries.  

Kinetic understands the niche requirements for all specialisms of this ever-increasing regulated industry. Wondering if your salary structure is correct in today’s market? Then download The Kinetic Salary and Employment Survey here.  

To find out more about how we can support you in your recruitment campaign or help you land your next career progression contact us here.