The Manager’s Playbook: How to Write Effective Performance Review Comments

For most people, the annual performance review can be a source of stress. Employees often feel judged or criticised, while managers struggle to find the right words to provide constructive, yet motivating, feedback.

However, a well-structured performance review is a vital tool for a positive workplace. The more specific and insightful the feedback, the more good that can come from it. Getting your performance review comments right can make a huge difference in an employee’s development and engagement.

Here, we show you some of the best supervisor comments and recommendations, helping you turn a potentially nerve-wracking meeting into a productive conversation.

Key Principles for Effective Performance Reviews

• Balance Positives and Negatives: Bad reviews can lead to low productivity and decreased morale. It’s crucial to balance constructive feedback with positive comments. Highlighting examples of good work and strengths is key to a good relationship with your staff.
• Set Clear Goals and Outlooks: In busy businesses, it’s not always possible to check in with every employee individually. Use the performance review as an opportunity to set personal goals and discuss their role in the wider team. This gives them something to strive for throughout the year.
• Encourage Dialogue: Don’t make it a one-way street. Give your staff the opportunity to respond to your suggestions. This may reveal other business issues and will certainly earn you more respect, opening the lines of communication for continuous feedback.

Sample Performance Review Phrases

The saying, “Always choose your words carefully,” is never more true than during a performance review. The secret is to craft your comments in a specific and succinct manner without sounding too harsh.

Here is a comprehensive list of example phrases, comments, and constructive feedback to inspire you for your next performance review, self-appraisal, 360 peer review, or just for offering continuous feedback.

Communication Skills

When covering an employee’s communication skills, you can use the following phrases:

• Effectively communicates his/her point of view and expectations.
• Effectively manages communication at all levels (lateral, upward, or downward flow of communication).
• Effectively manages and facilitates meetings and group discussions.
• Promotes action/task oriented meetings.
• Effectively enforces company values and policies without evoking negative reactions.
• Effectively communicates with clients.

Achievements

To highlight an employee’s achievements, you can use phrases such as:

• Achieved and exceeded the original set goals of “X” by a margin of “Y%”.
• Accomplished optimal levels of performance with great sincerity in areas such as…
• Showcased great team player abilities in executing …..
• Excelled and consistently improved at developing strategies/programs by delivering stellar performance in …..
• Improved his or her overall productivity levels by “X%”.
• Showcased proactiveness in various activities both within and outside the project.

Coaching/Training Abilities

When listing an employee’s coaching or training abilities, you can use the following phrases:

• Offered guidance and support to colleagues/peers by….
• Displayed a genuine interest in listening and addressing the problems shared by employees.
• Displayed strong training abilities by using sound training techniques to solve XYZ problems.
• Offered to provide continuous training in XYZ domain.
• Garnered great support and respect from employees for lending a patient ear to their problems and concerns.
• Created opportunities for employees in areas pertaining to…..

Interpersonal Skills

When jotting down points about an employee’s interpersonal skills, you may find these sample phrases helpful:

• Builds effective working/professional relationships with…
• Understands the needs of peers and offers a helping hand to…
• Promotes synergy within the team by….
• Follows and abides by the company culture and inspires the same amongst peers.
• Builds on understanding and mutual reliance.

Administrative Abilities

When covering the administrative abilities of an employee, you can use phrases such as:

• Developed successful strategies pertaining to administrative tasks such as….which produced amazing results.
• Consistently worked towards improvising and examining the effectiveness of XYZ administrative tasks.
• Effectively devised better procedures to perform XYZ tasks flawlessly.
• Established effective systems for retrieving lost data.
• Improved the existing administrative support systems by…
• Effectively maintained and organised documents to avoid duplication.

Innovation Skills

When listing your inputs regarding an employee’s innovative abilities, you can use the following phrases:

• Tries to innovate even under adverse conditions.
• Looks out for innovative solutions.
• Contributes towards innovative strategies.
• Fosters a spirit of innovation within the team.
• Actively participated in innovation events by …..

Collaboration Skills

Here are a couple of phrases you can use to describe an employee’s collaborative abilities:

• Encourages team bonding activities.
• Brings new ideas and techniques to promote collaboration within the team.
• Harbours and builds strong relationships with the team members.
• Displays a cooperative and harmonious nature.
• Proactively shares expertise with the rest of the team.

Delegation Abilities of Employees at a Senior Level

When writing about the delegation abilities of an employee, you can use the following examples:

• Encourages team members to solve issues at their end.
• Encourages and empowers employees to lead by example and provides all the required resources to achieve the same.
• Helps team members to gain visibility.
• Delegates thoughtfully by matching with an individual’s strengths.
• Delegates with precision and clarity.

Attendance

Here are a few sample phrases to describe an employee’s attendance record:

• Is punctual and consistently on-time to meetings.
• Arrives at meetings on time and is always prepared.
• Attained perfect attendance over X period.
• Schedules time-off according to company policy.
• Completes deadlines as promised.

Process Improvement Skills

Here are a couple of phrases you can use while listing an employee’s process improvement skills:

• Displayed consistent overall improvement and growth.
• Has an innate ability to think of various types of methods of improvement.
• Accomplished amazing results by displaying marked improvement in….
• Can consistently plan on the go towards improvement.

Customer Experience

Here are a few examples of how to describe a customer experience competency:

• Works effectively with clients.
• Builds strong rapport with clients he/she interacts with.
• Has a pleasant and friendly tone over the phone.
• Consistently drives effective customer experience strategies.
• Is empathetic towards customer issues.
• Is direct, yet helpful in dealing with customer concerns.
• Displays an effective cadence when working with clients on projects. Is effective, not overbearing.
• Can handle difficult customers with grace.

Learning Skills

Here are some examples of how you can jot down an employee’s learning ability during their performance review:

• Displays keenness towards learning new methods/techniques/skills.
• Is a rapid learner and adapts rapidly as well to changing situations.
• Quite open to share his or her learning experience with the peer group.
• Encourages and promotes a learning culture in the team.

Creative Abilities

Here are a couple of examples on how you can state an employee’s creative abilities:

• Ability to think out of the box in the most challenging situations.
• Ability to think of alternatives such as …..which produced brilliant results.
• Constantly strives to experiment to drive results.
• Has initiated and executed creative ideas such as……
• Looks out for new approaches and ideas.

Management and Supervisory Skills

Here are some phrases you can use to describe the management and supervisory abilities of an employee:

• Consistently provides support to the team.
• Promotes one-on-one communication with the team members to …..
• Provides the team with the required resources to achieve results.
• Provides support to the team during times of organisational transitioning.
• Provides timely feedback to employees.
• Gives credit and recognition to deserving team members.
• Always available to lend an ear and support to team members.
• Ensures that employees understand their roles and responsibilities clearly.

Critical Thinking and Problem Solving Skills

Phrases you can use while describing an employee’s problem-solving abilities:

• Capable of developing creative solutions.
• Look out for creative solutions with a practical approach towards problem-solving.
• Understands and effectively solves problems instead of focusing on the symptoms.
• Possesses the ability to propose options in times of need.
• Quite resourceful by showing skills to turn problems into opportunities…

Productivity and Time Management Abilities

While describing an individual’s productivity and time management abilities, you may use the following competency phrases:

• Consistently delivers beyond expectations.
• Exceeds the normal standards of output delivery.
• Substantially contributes towards the continued growth and operation of the organisation.
• Is an important pillar of success for the department.
• Always meets deadlines consistently.
• Displays respect towards the time of others.
• Maintains the schedule of meetings.

Potential of an Employee

Here are some examples on how to jot down the potential of an employee:

• Is capable of taking up a higher role with additional responsibilities.
• Is capable of being entrusted with bigger assignments and projects.
• Can enhance his or her skills further by participating in various classroom or external training programs.
• Has the potential to learn new and additional skills for future career advancement.

The Problem with Manual Performance Reviews

Following these phrases is a great first step, but writing a review is just one small part of the process. If you’re still relying on spreadsheets, emails, and manual follow-ups, you’re missing out on the full benefits of a strategic performance management system.

Manually writing and storing reviews can be a huge drain on time and resources. What’s worse, without a central, automated system, it’s easy for reviews to get lost, for data to become outdated, and for progress to be forgotten until the next review cycle.

The Solution: A Complete HR Platform

In the world of HR software, EmployeeConnect continues to be one of the leading providers of innovative solutions. We help Australian business owners and people managers be more efficient, cost-effective, and compliant by taking the hassle out of HR and payroll admin.

If you spend more than an hour every day on HR administration (like on/off-boarding, performance review, or employee timesheets), then EmployeeConnect is here for you. Our platform gives you the tools to create a seamless, data-driven performance management system that ensures no review gets missed and every piece of feedback is used to drive growth.

Ready to Simplify Your Performance Reviews?