7 things you should tell your boss at review time

Do you consider performance reviews a time purely for your manager to provide feedback? Well, you’re half right.

⁠A performance review provides the perfect opportunity to have a healthy two-way conversation with your manager about how you’re functioning in your role, what ambitions you have and other relevant issues.

Not all of us get formal reviews in the workplace, but it’s important to have a conversation with your boss about performance and goals one way or another.

For the best way to navigate this, here are the seven things you should tell your boss at review time.

1. What you love about your job, and what you wish you could be doing more of

Start off by talking about what you love about your job, and you’ll set a positive and productive context for your performance review.

You can start from listing all the activities within your role that energise you most and see if your manager can help you find ways to do even more of these tasks in the future.

For example, if you enjoy making promotional materials for your workplace as part of your marketing job, you could say, “I enjoy helping out with promotions and would love to be of assistance in that department regularly, if there’s an ongoing need.”

2. Other skills you have that you believe would benefit your workplace

For those who feel overlooked, you should know that your manager may not always be aware or may have forgotten what you have achieved, so it pays to document your value-adds before any performance review meetings.

Good preparation for a performance review might include listing all the skills that you have developed in the past twelve months and documenting ways that you have added value to the team and the organization.

Please note that working hard plus good presentation are the keys to career success.

3. The achievements you’re most proud of, and why

Thai people are taught to stay humble with a proverb like “Do good quietly; standing out can be dangerous”. So, speaking about achievement proudly may be something difficult for you. However, to advance your career growth, you can’t be just a wallflower. It’s important to talk about your achievements in the context of work. Consider how you have worked as part of the team to undertake them.

4. What you need in order to do your best work

The performance review is a great time to set goals that you want to achieve and including practical and realistic actions that you can take to achieve these goals. Exploring completing a formal course, job shadowing, gaining exposure to new areas of the business or finding a mentor to help build your skills and expertise.

5. The skills you want to gain and why

It’s important to continue upskilling, and raising your eagerness to gain new skills with your manager shows you care about your work. However, you need to make sure the skills you want to develop are related to your role, and that they will benefit your workplace. Your manager will surely love an employee who is ever-learning and ever-growing.

6. Which processes you think could improve, and how

Performance reviews are great opportunities to provide feedback on processes that you feel could be refined, and doing so will show your manager that you’re proactive. Keep in mind, though, that not all things can be changed.

⁠Come armed with a suggestion or two on what could be changed, and make sure you tie it back to improvements. Remember that to change the process, your manager will need to present a business case. The easier you make it for them, the more likely you are to get the change you want.

7. What you would like to achieve in the next 12 months

As with the skills you want to gain, this is your chance to demonstrate your alignment to the business. Try to find some common ground between what you want to do, and what the business is focusing on and set goals based on this. Discussing and aligning them with your manager means they’re more likely to support you, and having regular catch-ups to track progress helps keep you accountable and make you advance your career faster.