*16.02.2023 we republish this article for anyone who needs it. It is from 2022, but we put it back to the top of the list of articles to make it easier to find. Note that some of the information might relate specifically to 2022.* Many colleagues by now have finished their self-assessment and are awaiting the dialogue with their reporting officer. MyIntracomm has information on this dialogue, objectives, the report itself, the timeline and special situations, so is also worth a look (here is the somewhat less-detailed info for reclassification).

A couple of hints for this dialogue are in order [1].

• Stay positive, both in your attitude and in what you are saying. Even when faced with criticism, it is much better if your head of unit considers that you are accepting negative feedback instead of ignoring or refusing it.
• Prepare for the meeting: draw up a small list of points that you would like to raise and prepare them. Maybe your job description should be updated to reflect additional duties? It is good to mention this – even better if you can already provide a text snippet drafted. There is this interesting training course in EU Learn which you would like to attend? Mention it with details of the course and why you would like to attend it.
• Focus on your work and your tasks – the dialogue is about you, not about your colleagues.
• Have a look at your last appraisal report: has your workload increased since then? If yes, mention it in the dialogue, so that the new report reflects this. The same applies to new tasks or new knowledge that helps you perform better.
• Finally, DG HR has prepared two e-learning courses for the appraisal. You can participate in both courses without any need for an agreement by your hierarchy. Indeed, we recommend that you take both courses, even if the second one is for the reporting officer – it will show you what you can expect in the dialogue.
• added 09.02.2022: ‘With the agreement of the jobholder, the reporting officer may ask one or more other jobholders who have supervised the jobholder’s work to take part in the dialogue.’ (Article 6, point 3, 2013 Decision) (thanks to our reader who provided this information!)
• added 09.02.2022: Check out Harassment Watch Network, 2021, Abuse of the annual appraisal exercise (“CDR”) in the European Commission as tool of psychological harassment with recommendations how to prevent this and better protect the targetted colleagues: second analytical paper.
  
• added 18.02.2022: the CDR evaluation mark is ‘unsatisfactory’, what now?

As always, feel free to contact us if you have questions: we’re here for you!

[1] See also slides 20-21 in the corresponding presentation or slide 19 in this one.

The average promotion speeds for officials are laid down in the staff regulations Annex I.B  and here is our chart with those percentages converted to years. Contract Agent (3a) reclassification speeds can be found on page 3 of this document. Unfortunately, CA 3b staff cannot be reclassified, meaning their appraisal has no rewards associated with it.