Its assessment time

Its December and its the time of the year where managers and their superiors along with the influential human resources team sit together and discuss on which employee gets what kind of a rating at the end of the year for all the hard work that he has put in during the year.

To make it look like a very serious effort they use the acronym TBDM for this excercise.

I happened to bump into my manager Venkat’apathy’ and asked him . ‘Hey Venkat seem to be busy ( for a change) ‘Oh yeah buddy I am in a TBDM since 8AM and we expect this to last till atleast 10 PM’ Venkat said winking at me as though to give me a hint that even my career progression was going to be discussed today .

Considering the novice that I was I quickly asked my senior colleague Kumar what TBDM was. To which he said ..’ Come on Nitin , don’t tell me that you didn’t know what TBDM was’ ‘Not really’  I said . Well then  TBDM means Team Based Decision Making ‘ said Kumar .

I then asked Kumar what exactly happens in these meetings. Kumar with a sigh said  ‘Well Nitin . do you want the right answer or a nice sweet answer ‘ . I said Kumar Sir I would like to know both. ‘So here you go ‘ he said ‘  The nice answer is that TBDM is a process where managers across different teams sit and discuss the contributions of each individual, the focus here is not only on what they have contributed to their team and but to the organization as well .

Individuals who have taken the initiative and helped other teams, conducting training programs, participating in organizational events, filed for patents and the likes and at the end each candidate is rated based on their actual contributions ‘ sounds interesting I thought to myself. So then Kumar what is the right answer I asked imperatively. With his charateristic  cheeky smile  Kumar said ‘ Its actually pretty simple in this TBDM, managers try to push forth the names of their subordinates who really matter and in most cases succeed in doing so’ 

I naively asked  ‘ You mean those who are very important to the team’  Not Really came the reply from Kumar. When I say ‘ Really matter it means the ones who really matter to the manager, the ones who constantly strive to impress their bosses, the ones who just leave the office immediately after the boss has left, the ones who organizes the team lunches and the birthday parties, the ones who send business as usual mails also at 4.30 am, the ones who attend conference calls even if it doesn’t concern them in any way, the ones who are the first to say ‘Yes Sir’ for anything  that the boss says, the ones log on even on Independence day, Republic Day and Labour day  and send reminders mail to the rest of the team with a CC to the boss.

To cut things short it means its basically those guys who take the INITIATIVE

Thinking for a few seconds I said Kumar Sir  ‘ Some call it Initiative while some call it Sucking Up ‘

Kumar wittingly said ‘You are a very quick learner Nitin‘

I did not dare to say ‘Yes Sir’.