# performance self-evaluation **URL:** \ **Category:** Chatting over the Back Fence\ **Created:** [October 23, 2013, 7:32pm UTC](https://forums.suse.com/t/performance-self-evaluation/24663 "2013-10-23T19:32:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![System1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/51bf81/32.png) [@System1](https://forums.suse.com/u/System1)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2013, 7:32pm UTC](https://forums.suse.com/t/performance-self-evaluation/24663/1 "2013-10-23T19:32:38Z")
My company has changed its methods of performance review to incorporate the labor-saving (for those who matter) step of having employees evaluate themselves. I know that many of you have had to wrestle with this very issue, and because you are the smartest group of people around, I know I am turning to the right advisors when I ask you: What is the cleverest and most professional way of stating that you are doing the work of three to four people, with fewer resources than were available to you a decade ago, and therefore the fact that “the lights are still on” is a testament to your ability and general staunchness? ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex022/uploads/suse/original/2X/5/5012ba89e3ffb5220dac47d5ea0ba032e2fe1cb6.png) [@system](https://forums.suse.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2013, 8:05pm UTC](https://forums.suse.com/t/performance-self-evaluation/24663/2 "2013-10-23T20:05:55Z")
First guess, if this is because of some “reorg” or whatever perhaps indicate something like: “Took on responsibilities x0, y0, and z0 of person 0.” “Took on responsibilities x1, y1, and z1 of person 1.” etc. If these are tasks in IT (or other relevant fields) that are being follows, perhaps explain how you have automated them (if indeed you did) so that there is less manual work for you so you can waste more time analyzing results, setting up more automation, or updating your resume. – Good luck. If you find this post helpful and are logged into the web interface, show your appreciation and click on the star below… ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex022/uploads/suse/original/2X/5/5012ba89e3ffb5220dac47d5ea0ba032e2fe1cb6.png) [@system](https://forums.suse.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2013, 10:15pm UTC](https://forums.suse.com/t/performance-self-evaluation/24663/3 "2013-10-23T22:15:59Z")
Mary Wood sounds like they ‘said’: [color=blue] > therefore the > fact that “the lights are still on” is a testament to your ability > and general staunchness?[/color] So my response to Mary’s comment is… Let the lights ‘go out’ once or twice. In the explanation why, tell TPTB you have the job responsibilities of 3 or 4 people and sometimes can’t keep up once in a great while. 😉 – Stevo ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex022/uploads/suse/original/2X/5/5012ba89e3ffb5220dac47d5ea0ba032e2fe1cb6.png) [@system](https://forums.suse.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2013, 11:20pm UTC](https://forums.suse.com/t/performance-self-evaluation/24663/4 "2013-10-23T23:20:22Z")
If the lights NEVER go out, they will never appreciate you. Quickly fixing a broken network is what makes an admin great. Running a network that never breaks means the admin is not needed, not that they are so good they keep it humming like a well oiled machine. We admins know this is not true, but the accts dont. On 10/23/2013 3:15 PM, Stevo wrote:[color=blue] > Mary Wood sounds like they ‘said’: > [color=green] > > > therefore the > > fact that “the lights are still on” is a testament to your ability > > and general staunchness?[/color] > > So my response to Mary’s comment is… > > Let the lights ‘go out’ once or twice. In the explanation why, tell > TPTB you have the job responsibilities of 3 or 4 people and sometimes > can’t keep up once in a great while. 😉 > [/color] ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex022/uploads/suse/original/2X/5/5012ba89e3ffb5220dac47d5ea0ba032e2fe1cb6.png) [@system](https://forums.suse.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2013, 11:34pm UTC](https://forums.suse.com/t/performance-self-evaluation/24663/5 "2013-10-23T23:34:04Z")
On Wed, 23 Oct 2013 20:20:22 +0000, Craig Wilson wrote: [color=blue] > If the lights NEVER go out, they will never appreciate you. Quickly > fixing a broken network is what makes an admin great.[/color] If the organization understands that. I once worked for a company that didn’t understand that. Instead of being happy that I was able to recover most of the data from a crashed server (by calling in a few favors), they were angry that I “hadn’t told them the backups were no good” (which actually meant “I hadn’t made them listen to me when I said the backups were failing”). Some companies do look to mete out blame when IT systems fail. Those companies tend to not retain competent admins for very long. Jim – Jim Henderson, CNA6, CDE, CNI, LPIC-1, CLA10, CLP10 Novell/SUSE/NetIQ Knowledge Partner ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex022/uploads/suse/original/2X/5/5012ba89e3ffb5220dac47d5ea0ba032e2fe1cb6.png) [@system](https://forums.suse.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2013, 11:57am UTC](https://forums.suse.com/t/performance-self-evaluation/24663/6 "2013-10-24T11:57:33Z")
Jim Henderson [hendersj@no-mx.forums.novell.com](mailto:hendersj@no-mx.forums.novell.com) wrote in news:0pW9u.351 $tt6.296@kovat.provo.novell.com: [color=blue] > On Wed, 23 Oct 2013 20:20:22 +0000, Craig Wilson wrote: > [color=green] > > > If the lights NEVER go out, they will never appreciate you. Quickly > > fixing a broken network is what makes an admin great.[/color] > > If the organization understands that.[/color] Most don’t. At all. A bad sign is the term “Hard Drive” referring to the PC on the desk from Management, especially when it is your boss or your boss’s boss. [color=blue] > I once worked for a company that didn’t understand that. Instead of > being happy that I was able to recover most of the data from a crashed > server (by calling in a few favors), they were angry that I “hadn’t told > them the backups were no good” (which actually meant “I hadn’t made them > listen to me when I said the backups were failing”).[/color] /Mumble [color=blue] > Some companies do look to mete out blame when IT systems fail. Those > companies tend to not retain competent admins for very long. > > Jim > [/color] I heard of an admin getting caught making errors he could easily fix. Don’t be that person. Be the “Is there anything else I can do for you while I am here” person. ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex022/uploads/suse/original/2X/5/5012ba89e3ffb5220dac47d5ea0ba032e2fe1cb6.png) [@system](https://forums.suse.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2013, 5:18pm UTC](https://forums.suse.com/t/performance-self-evaluation/24663/7 "2013-10-24T17:18:14Z")
Mary: State it as directly as you stated it in your message. That’s how most men would do it. Just because we’re women doesn’t mean we need to be shrinking violets when it comes to self-evaluation. While we’ve been taught as young girls that it’s not good to do so, we work in a still mostly male industry. So you need to evaluate yourself just as a man would evaluate himself - directly. You’ll still be more on target than some men would be - some tend to have a higher opinion of themselves than reality warrants, all present company excepted otherwise I’d have thrown you out long ago, so your self-evaulation will still seem more modest than other evaluations. Feel free to use a phrase I used in my cover letter for a number of years: “I’m hesitant to let out a toot of my horn, lest in so-doing I come across sounding like the entire brass section of the New York Philharmonic, and I …(list all the things you did that weren’t done by the person before you and probably wouldn’t be able to be done by the person who comes after you).” I was told by several managers, company owners, human resources people that it was the best cover letter they’ve ever read. So feel free to use humor. It works. Susan ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex022/uploads/suse/original/2X/5/5012ba89e3ffb5220dac47d5ea0ba032e2fe1cb6.png) [@system](https://forums.suse.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2013, 3:55am UTC](https://forums.suse.com/t/performance-self-evaluation/24663/8 "2013-10-25T03:55:01Z")
On Thu, 24 Oct 2013 08:57:33 +0000, Dave Taylor wrote: [color=blue] > Jim Henderson [hendersj@no-mx.forums.novell.com](mailto:hendersj@no-mx.forums.novell.com) wrote in news:0pW9u.351 > $tt6.296@kovat.provo.novell.com: > [color=green] > > > On Wed, 23 Oct 2013 20:20:22 +0000, Craig Wilson wrote: > > [color=darkred] > > > > > If the lights NEVER go out, they will never appreciate you. Quickly > > > fixing a broken network is what makes an admin great.[/color] > > > > If the organization understands that.[/color] > > Most don’t. At all. A bad sign is the term “Hard Drive” referring to > the PC on the desk from Management, especially when it is your boss or > your boss’s boss.[/color] I’ve worked for some that did - and they were great companies to work for. It’s the ones that think technology never fails without human intervention that you need to be extremely wary of. [color=blue][color=green] > > I once worked for a company that didn’t understand that. Instead of > > being happy that I was able to recover most of the data from a crashed > > server (by calling in a few favors), they were angry that I “hadn’t > > told them the backups were no good” (which actually meant “I hadn’t > > made them listen to me when I said the backups were failing”).[/color] > > /Mumble[/color] I had a lot more to say about it than that. I’ve told the story here before about that - I was scheduled for a sponsored trip to N+I that year, and the employer was going to make me take vacation time for the trip. The excuse given was “if the plane crashes, our insurance would be responsible for paying out, and since we’re not paying for the trip, it’d just be a mess to sort it out.” Yeah, because planes between SLC and Las Vegas crash every other day. They had apparently never heard of a nifty little legal thing called a “waiver of liability”. So when they decided to _suspend me without pay_ (for their failure to listen to me), they pitched my ability to go to N+I without buring vacation time as a “silver lining”. So I went. I learned stuff. I then refused to use what I learned on the job. Didn’t stay much longer after that - one instance of “Oh, you know, I talked to 3Com at N+I about something like this, but I don’t remember now what they told me.” I was a _lot_ younger (and far less wise) then. 🙂 But it did feel good to be able to say that (at the time). When I left (over a different issue - a very poor manager to doled out blame and grabbed all the praise for the team’s work), I left with nothing to go to - and even though I nearly lost my house because of the lack of work, having _nothing_ to go to was an improvement in circumstances. That place was “the underworld” to work at. 😉 [color=blue][color=green] > > Some companies do look to mete out blame when IT systems fail. Those > > companies tend to not retain competent admins for very long. > > > > Jim > > > > [/color] > > I heard of an admin getting caught making errors he could easily fix. > > Don’t be that person. Be the “Is there anything else I can do for you > > while I am here” person.[/color] Yep, that’s excellent advice. Those who could be identified as “Mordac, the preventer of information services” tend not to last long. ## Jim Jim Henderson, CNA6, CDE, CNI, LPIC-1, CLA10, CLP10 Novell/SUSE/NetIQ Knowledge Partner ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex022/uploads/suse/original/2X/5/5012ba89e3ffb5220dac47d5ea0ba032e2fe1cb6.png) [@system](https://forums.suse.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2013, 7:55pm UTC](https://forums.suse.com/t/performance-self-evaluation/24663/9 "2013-10-25T19:55:55Z")
I used to have a Mordac cartoon taped to my door. Hehe. “Jim Henderson” wrote in message [news:Fjjau.497$tt6.149@kovat.provo.novell.com](mailto:news:Fjjau.497$tt6.149@kovat.provo.novell.com)… On Thu, 24 Oct 2013 08:57:33 +0000, Dave Taylor wrote: [color=blue] > Jim Henderson [hendersj@no-mx.forums.novell.com](mailto:hendersj@no-mx.forums.novell.com) wrote in news:0pW9u.351 > $tt6.296@kovat.provo.novell.com: > [color=green] > > > On Wed, 23 Oct 2013 20:20:22 +0000, Craig Wilson wrote: > > [color=darkred] > > > > > If the lights NEVER go out, they will never appreciate you. Quickly > > > fixing a broken network is what makes an admin great.[/color] > > > > If the organization understands that.[/color] > > Most don’t. At all. A bad sign is the term “Hard Drive” referring to > the PC on the desk from Management, especially when it is your boss or > your boss’s boss.[/color] I’ve worked for some that did - and they were great companies to work for. It’s the ones that think technology never fails without human intervention that you need to be extremely wary of. [color=blue][color=green] > > I once worked for a company that didn’t understand that. Instead of > > being happy that I was able to recover most of the data from a crashed > > server (by calling in a few favors), they were angry that I “hadn’t > > told them the backups were no good” (which actually meant “I hadn’t > > made them listen to me when I said the backups were failing”).[/color] > > /Mumble[/color] I had a lot more to say about it than that. I’ve told the story here before about that - I was scheduled for a sponsored trip to N+I that year, and the employer was going to make me take vacation time for the trip. The excuse given was “if the plane crashes, our insurance would be responsible for paying out, and since we’re not paying for the trip, it’d just be a mess to sort it out.” Yeah, because planes between SLC and Las Vegas crash every other day. They had apparently never heard of a nifty little legal thing called a “waiver of liability”. So when they decided to _suspend me without pay_ (for their failure to listen to me), they pitched my ability to go to N+I without buring vacation time as a “silver lining”. So I went. I learned stuff. I then refused to use what I learned on the job. Didn’t stay much longer after that - one instance of “Oh, you know, I talked to 3Com at N+I about something like this, but I don’t remember now what they told me.” I was a _lot_ younger (and far less wise) then. 🙂 But it did feel good to be able to say that (at the time). When I left (over a different issue - a very poor manager to doled out blame and grabbed all the praise for the team’s work), I left with nothing to go to - and even though I nearly lost my house because of the lack of work, having _nothing_ to go to was an improvement in circumstances. That place was “the underworld” to work at. 😉 [color=blue][color=green] > > Some companies do look to mete out blame when IT systems fail. Those > > companies tend to not retain competent admins for very long. > > > > Jim > > > > [/color] > > I heard of an admin getting caught making errors he could easily fix. > > Don’t be that person. Be the “Is there anything else I can do for you > > while I am here” person.[/color] Yep, that’s excellent advice. Those who could be identified as “Mordac, the preventer of information services” tend not to last long. ## Jim Jim Henderson, CNA6, CDE, CNI, LPIC-1, CLA10, CLP10 Novell/SUSE/NetIQ Knowledge Partner