Get ready for your next personal development review

When it's time for your annual personal development review (In Danish: medarbejderudviklingssamtale or MUS), it's a good idea to look back at what tasks you’ve enjoyed, and to look ahead to tasks and projects you'd like to be part of in the future.

Maybe you have no idea what to say during this meeting with your manager. You may think it's unnecessary or just a but awkward. Your personal development review can seem like quite the hassle if you're not motivated or don't know how to go about it. That's why we put together this guide to help you make the most of your next review with your manager.

The development review is a golden opportunity for you to take stock of your career aspirations, make an active plan to stay market-ready, and to have a dialogue with your manager about your dreams and ambitions. It's also your opportunity to highlight the contributions you've made throughout the year.

The questions you need to ask yourself before your personal development review

Ask yourself the following questions:

• What tasks do I have that energise me and what tasks drain me?
• Do I have a good friend at work? In other words, a good professional sparring partner who makes me feel better. Everyone needs someone to discuss things with, and if you need a sparring partner, you can bring it up during the interview.
• If I want to increase my enjoyment of work in the coming years, what is the most important thing to do?

You can begin your preparation by looking at your current tasks. The tasks that boost your performance and give you energy should fill at least 70-80% of your workday. Tasks that drain your energy should not cover more than 20-30%.

Consider the current distribution of your tasks, and what it would take to achieve the right balance to boost your performance and ensure your well-being at work.

Prepare all year

Instead of starting to prepare on the day before the interview, you should prepare for your next personal development review 365 days a year.

This doesn't mean that you have to spend hours each week preparing. Setting aside 5-10 minutes each week keeping a log or in some other way regularly keeping track of your results at work will ensure that you have constant focus on your development - and give you plenty of things to discuss in your review.

How to talk to your manager about your tasks

When mapping your own tasks, you'll get an idea of what to share with your manager. It could be things like:

• This is what I want to do more of
• This is what I want to do less of because it does not motivate me
• This is what I want to get off my desk completely
• This is what I miss and would like to work more on

Remember to support your points with concrete examples of why this would also be good for the company.

Update your career and development goals

It is a good idea to consider your dreams and goals for your career and formulate a number of career goals or development goals. Remember that opportunities for development can come from several places. This is what the 70-20-10 ratio is all about.

70% of your development should come from your job, 20% through a coach, a mentor or an experienced colleague, and only 10% through actual training and education. Therefore, consider how your development goals fit in. Be very specific at the personal development review - for instance by presenting specific ways for you to reach your goals.

What can you learn in your job? For example, if you want to be a manager, is there a student assistant you can be in charge of? Can you become a project manager – and perhaps take a project management course? Is there a manager who could be your coach?

Agree on concrete plans for your development

It is important that you are specific about your wishes. For example, if you want to go on a training programme, make it easy for your manager by outlining it:

• How much time it will take?
• What the company will get out of it?
• Who can take on the work tasks in the meantime?

Make sure you get in writing which new tasks you'll be taking on and which you'll be getting rid of so that your agreement is concrete and documented.

You may find that you and your manager have different interests. In this situation, you need to make a plan that both you and your manager are comfortable with so you can leave the old role and take on a new role in a sustainable way. Make sure to argue from the company's interests.

You can dive deeper into how to talk to your manager about skills development in this article: 

How to make time for continuing education

Remember to talk to your manager throughout the year

It's important to talk about development and goals on an ongoing basis, otherwise you risk being forgotten in a busy workday. So talk to your manager regularly and don't save everything for your performance review, which after all - in most workplaces - is only once a year.

Don't give up on your goals

When you set your goals, it's important that you take responsibility for achieving them. However, you also need to be constructive if time passes and nothing happens. It's a good idea to start by finding out why you didn't achieve what you set out to do at your last performance review. If you generally feel that there's too much loose talk at the interview, stick to concretising your wishes and goals and say:

‘We talked about this last time, but nothing has happened yet, so what can we do to make something happen this time?’

If you realise that you can't achieve your goals, consider pursuing them in a different workplace.

What to say at your development review if you're thriving

A performance review is an alignment of expectations with your manager about where you are right now and where you want to go. If you're riding a wave where everything is going well and you want to continue in the same style, focus on that:

• Say you're doing well and what makes you feel good - both professionally and personally
• Make your results and contributions visible to your manager.

If you can get your manager to nod to what you do and are happy about, you can maintain it. This can be just as important as development initiatives. If you're at a point in your life where you are really busy, now may not be the time or energy for training and new roles, but simply for maintaining the status quo.

Be strategic about your wishes

Consider your wishes and priorities in the context of the company's strategy and goals, and you'll be more likely to be listened to by your manager. For example, if it's just been announced that downsizing is coming, this might not be the time to ask for an expensive training programme.

However, you should always mention if something is preventing you from functioning in your job. If you're told that there's no way you can solve the challenge and it's a very central element to your working life, then you might want to look for other opportunities.

You can also think about planting a small seed ahead of the salary negotiation you will have at a later date. You could say, preferably in an informal way, that ‘’your achievements are something your manager can keep in mind when you have a salary discussion at some point‘’.

What can you achieve at your development review if you're going elsewhere?

If you want to change jobs and you're about to leave, it may not seem important to have an MUS interview. But it's important that you still take the interview seriously, partly because you can't know how long it will take to make a job change. It's also easier to sell yourself into a new position if you're full of good energy.