Reverse Annual Evaluation

Annual Evaluations are both nervous and exciting times in most companies. That’s because a team member is forced to face the relative truth about how the management perceives them and their work.

However, the management’s perception may not always be 100% accurate. So we’ve come up with a better way to preempt the annual evaluation of each member in the team.

And it starts with the individual team member.

Here’s the process:

1. Team member needs to compile what he/she has contributed to the company on top of his/her job description – be as objective as possible
2. Review the Mechanisms with Teeth and see if he/she has accumulated at least 5 points
3. Compose an email to be sent to the management about your 5 points and justify how each point has been achieved
4. Put in a narrative of the things you contributed to the company that is outside of your job description
5. Send the email with the subject line: “Reverse Annual Evaluation”
6. State in the email body when you started with SEO Hacker and when you got regularized
7. If you have been through a reverse annual evaluation before, state the day when it was last awarded
8. Within the email state the reasons why you deserve the raise AND why you are successful in your job
9. Clearly state what new things the management will expect from you for this raise as it is a trade of value-for-value
10. Note that the upper limit for a raise is at 10%
11. Cite actual examples and cases where you exemplified our core values. Be detailed about it on the day, time, people involved, what you did and why that is something that brings us closer to our mission and vision.
12. The management will review the email and decide if it is approved or rejected
13. If approved, we will move the annual evaluation to the management’s perspective – which is now an expedited process since the points in the reverse annual evaluation are valid
14. Fill out your Growth Plan, print it and then sign it and submit it to the execom and HR.

Do note that the annual evaluation in SEO Hacker is quite strictly a matter of salary increase since we already have our Fast Feedback Loops as a loose monthly evaluation of our work and character.

We believe that it should be the team member’s responsibility to be self-aware of where they are in their contribution to the company. If a team member desires their salary to increase, it is primarily their responsibility to know that they have done enough or more than enough to merit it.

This is a win-win in the sense that the transparency and self-awareness from the employee will make it faster for the management to make a decision and at the same time, the team member does not need to wait for the management’s time-frame on when to evaluate them.