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The Senior Management Committee were asked to reinstate their commitment to PDRs and share why they believe they are important.

Photo of members of the Medical Statistics Group, Rafael Perera (left), Richard Stevens (centre), Clare Bankhead (right).

Why the stats team support PDRs

Some of our team ask, what’s the point of PDRs, when they only cover the things we should be discussing with our line managers / team members anyway?  Here are some reasons that we have found PDRs useful.

Sometimes our regular conversations are all about short-term issues: getting work done and meeting deadlines.  Stopping to do a PDR reminds line managers to keep an eye on other things over the longer term.  A PDR reminds a line manager to make time to talk about your career goals and your training needs.

Likewise, a PDR reminds you and your line manager to take a look back over the previous year, with a longer perspective than usual – not just the recent deadlines and current projects.

Finally a PDR is a good opportunity to look at how the line management relationship is working.  Has communication been working well?  Has the line manager been available when most needed?  Is the line manager up to date on all the things the team member is working on?  It’s an opportunity for the employee to make sure the line manager has the whole picture.

All of these are things that a good line management relationship should include anyway.  Perhaps your line manager, or you as a line manager, already cover all of these things routinely, but a PDR is a chance to make sure you’ve covered all of these at least once a year.  Conversely, if once a year is not frequent enough for some of these conversations, the PDR is a chance to raise that and to make a plan for discussing those issues more frequently.

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