I worked for a company that did these kind of performance reviews and it was exactly as you describe. I found it basically "unworkable" because you end up with

I worked for a company that did these kind of performance reviews and it was exactly as you describe. I found it basically "unworkable" because you end up with 2 jobs- (1) the actual technical job you were hired to do and (2) trying to not be screwed by the performance process. So you have to play politics, constantly watch what others do, try to advertise and sell the work you've done to managers. What if you're only interested in writing good code, not bragging about it? Especially if you're in tech because your skills are technical, not the schmoozing stuff. Some of the best developers are either introverted (which is fine :) ) or simply more interested in elegant technical solutions to real actual problems, than political BS. This performance process also makes people become rivals. They have to show they're better than their peers. Which is 100% destructive to teamwork. Then there's the unpredictability. In a good workplace, someone can work hard, deliver, forge relationships and as time goes on they become very trusted. What you don't want is that person constantly distracted by having to prove themselves. You don't want the situation where years of good work suddenly for no apparent reason comes up against something in performance management and get marked down. Another case, I saw 2 colleagues have misunderstandings due to geographical distance, culture, possible mental health issues by 1 of them. It all got worked out and fixed amicably, no lingering grudges, but one of them still I believe got a sub-par end of year, thus blocking a way to leave that situation behind. That cannot be helpful. Also such performance systems promote those more skilled at gaming the system than those who would do best in the more senior role. Thus you end up with incompetent managers, and technical staff that are good at stealing ideas and flogging them as their own, but can't really code well. I'm glad I got the ** out of there, into a workplace that values friendship and collaboration instead !! Is this the norm in big tech these days? If so.. well to me it just adds a big random element to everything. You can try to work hard, gain skills, deliver, but other factors can mean you aren't recognised. This was always true to some extent, you need a decent boss , company needs to be doing well etc, but my feeling is the "good old days" were more predictable. I wonder if this performance cr*p ultimately drives away good engineers, and it'll all come full circle when companies realise its a a bad idea. But then, I thought that happened years ago at Microsoft when they ditched "stack ranking"? Maybe this keeps bubbling up? I mean , some daft managers think its a good idea, it looks like its working for a while, then anyone decent gets hacked off and leaves to competitors, then they abandon it, till later some so-called bright spark re-invents it?