Mark's Blog

Could you dislike it because, you get rated and the other guy doesn't?
I used to hate formal performance reviews, too. Mainly the ones I had to do for other people. Mostly because I took LOTS of time to write one that was fair but pointed out actual ways to improve with lots of details.
I didn't like them because they seemed so cut and dried. I am not against evaluation. That is necessary to keep on track or get better, but huge, yearly goals seemed so nebulous and hard to get too sometimes, especially when they involved other people doing what they were supposed to.
Mom

Everybody gets rated. The manager gets rated, too. I don't think it's necessarily the rating that bothers me. My managers have been nice to me, giving me better ratings than I deserve.

Of course I'd tend to rate us all lower than average. Kind of a dark side Lake Wobegon.

I agree about the huge, yearly goals being part of the problem. If you really got around to this every week instead of every year, and kept track, it would make sense to consolidate things at some point, but each measurement would allow for correction. Do it once a year and you've given everything time to fester when you finally get around to it.