Annual Review was bad how do I bounce back?
My annual review was bad. Said I need better responsiveness and attention to detail. Anyone here ever had a bad review and bounced back? Work from home was difficult. How can I get better?
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Be more responsive and have more attention to detail
Eh, not really much coming back and your impression is set for the rest of your analyst stint (I'm assuming you're an analyst). Likely your bonus will be affected and they will nitpick every little thing you do going forward and then put you on a performance warning. Possibly 3-6 months until you're fired or indicated you are not on a path to promotion. Start interviewing. Don't take it the wrong way, this happened to me recently and I ended up getting multiple interviews instantly and landed a significantly higher paying job offer in less than a month into my search
I actually think this is a very good point. First impressions stick. The first IB shop I was at I wasn't very good at my job (I'm naturally a slow learner) and I truly felt the weight of being treated as such. I left because I felt the environment was toxic and I took what I learned at my next shop and things improved greatly because I was experienced and didn't feel judged.
Sometimes people need fresh starts.
Second this, it's a truly underrated point. Writing was on the wall for me at a small boutique during covid, but I stuck around because I thought I didn't have great, transferable skills. Ended up getting let go, found my next job, and learned more in the first 3 months than I did in 1 year prior. Been at my current gig for a year now and its amazing what a fresh start can do not only for confidence, but also your perception of the workplace and IB in general.
You don't have to be irrational and quick to act, but being ready to make a sound decision fast is something that will help tremendously in your situation. I know because I've been there.
No bouncing back unfortunately. Superstars stay superstars once their reputation is crystallized as an analyst, and underperformer reputation sticks around. I would say have an honest assessment on whether or not "attention to detail" just isn't your thing, or was something else impacting your performance during this time. In my experience things people try to improve but something is just fundamentally holding them back (it's just not who they are to pay attention to details, for example). It doesn't mean you can't be good at other things though.
I would say start finding another job where there's a low chance folks there have access to your old colleagues (they always check), and then do better when you get there if you feel this is still the career path you want to pursue. If not, maybe try your hand at something else that requires more "big picture" skills and less "attention to detail" type qualities.
Please shut the fuck up
Don't listen to the 2 idiots above. You can always bounce back in your second year, its not the end of the world. Take the comments with stride and work on them. Type a list of checklists to always go over before you send off a deliverable, print it out, keep it next to you, and use it at all times so you don't miss important details like Titles, Footnotes, Logos, Format, Comments, Numbers Tying out, etc. Fastest way to improve your detail-oriented skills. These retards telling you its over and you're about to be fired are a joke. Crazy how people overreact in this field. You'll look back on this 5 years later and laugh at these dumbasses telling you to switch jobs because of a 1st year review. This job is not rocket science. There are systems and structures you can create that will drastically improve your performance. I've known bottom buckets that became top buckets their following year. I've known top buckets that became middle-low buckets because they went hard first year and weren't able to sustain their hardo performance the following year. Consistency and stability is key.
Like I said, don't let the two idiots make you nervous. The first idiot's name is "BigBankerBrand." The second idiot's name is "LarryUVA." I mean, come on.
Everyone has their own pace and that goes for your job and life in general.
As long as you're actively working on the issues pointed out in your review and taking the necessary steps to make sure you're improving daily, you shouldn't be nervous at all.
I’m not trying to be overly negative here, but the others you referenced have points that seem to mostly be true in reality.
Every person I know that has had a bad review, has always become the guy that everyone criticizes extra, shits on extra, feels more comfortable complaining about. If you have a good review your first year, your work may not even be scrutinized, whereas if you get that bad review, supervisors begin to look for any error at all to criticize the poor guy for
Had a similar situation in my first year as an analyst and IMO it 100% depends on your group's culture and your relationship with the group, so its really your judgement call.
If you are in a group with good culture and have decent relationship with the group, it's likely that the review is reflective of your true performance and you need to improve. If you do show improvement, they would typically acknowledge in a mid-year review or something and the issue is solved.
If you are in a shitty group and have a poor working relationship, I would try to leave ASAP cause even if you improve they won't acknowledge it and your reputation is set in stone. TBH you can find mistakes and come up with "areas of improvement" for any analyst if you try. Like the above user said, you don't want them to be nit picking everything you do from now on and just focus on your mistakes even if you are really improving.
IMO unless you really like this group/bank, I would try to lateral just to be safe. Wayyy easier to start fresh then to try and change people's perception of you.
Hey, it is not a big deal, really. Focus on the positive fact that someone is telling you, early in your career, what you need to get better at, this is priceless. I would use this opportunity to improve on those "weak" areas highlighted in your performance review and the best way I know (at least it works for me) is to buddy up with a more senior team member and tell him you are determined to improve on x, y and z but you are not sure what's the best way forward, then ask him if he is willing to help you out and guide you through your improvement process. This way you will not only learn but you will build rapport with your teammates. Key piece of advice that I received earlier in my career and worked wonders for me - ask for constant feedback instead of waiting for your performance review to come. This way you will always know what to expect and avoid surprises.
In reality, you need to understand you are just starting off and this is marathon, we all make mistakes and have things to improve on but what will determine your success in life is how you learn from your mistakes and how you react to unexpected swings in life. Always keep a positive attitude and when you do make a mistake, don't take it too personal, just try not to make it again.
Some of the commenters here must have worked for real assholes (or just really sucked and failed to improve). Your superiors just want you to churn out solid work product and save them time. If you start saving them time (by producing good work that they don't constantly find hiccups in while error checking) they'll like you again. If you continue to waste their time and produce bad work they'll get sick of dealing with it and you'll eventually get pushed out. No one gives that much of a shit about analysts to judge them outside of if they can count on you or not. It really doesn't take anything other than a few positive performances on pitches/deals to turn into someone they believe they can count on.
Ignore the comments re: finding another job. If you leave now then you learn nothing and frankly you’re just setting yourself up to leave future jobs when they get ahard. That can easily develop into a pattern where you’ll never stick around long enough to actually fix your issues. There may come a time for you to leave but given you’re in a group with a good culture and like the people you work with, they’re probably not the total assholes that many think of in banking. I worked with top-bucket and bottom-bucket analysts, was a top-bucket analyst myself, and frankly the differentiator was how hard you worked and how seriously you took the job. Granted it was a bigger group and there were disproportionately more top-bucket analysts given we all worked our asses off, but the point remains. Not to be an IB hardo but if you find yourself leaving well before other analysts then maybe consider spending more time checking your work. The checklist idea is absolutely the way to go, make sure you hit every single item before sending along. But also, your associate’s job is to catch anything you missed so unless you’re sending work directly to VPs/MDs, I’d hope they’re actually going through the turns and what not before mindlessly passing along.
My only piece of new advice vs what others have said is that if you want to really improve then tell a senior person that you work with/trust is interested in your development. If they’re actually trustworthy then they’ll respect the humility and can likely provide tangible examples where you dropped the ball which should then give you a jumping off point on what you can improve. They’ll also pick up that you’re taking both the review process and your personal development seriously and will be much more lenient/internally supportive as you improve. Might even result in getting more staffings with them and building even more trust. There is another benefit of this approach too - you’ll know where you stand. In many orgs a performance plan is an HR paper trail that sets you up to get canned. If they’re considering putting you on a performance plan, you can talk to them before they do it and feel out if they’re willing to provide real feedback/help you develop. If they give you generic answers then you know they don’t really care and can plan accordingly. But if you get real feedback then you can build trust that will extend to other things and could (maybe even likely) lead to your internal promotion or a buy side role in time.