Re: employee of the year
" It can certainly be a right royal pain in the ars3 with all the "counselling" and "training opportunities" and "performance plans""
I've suffered that.
Some years back we had a totally useless *specialist* teacher in a part of our service, who was just wasting the life chances of the kids he was supposedly supporting. Time after time he'd survived disciplinaries, with all the mentoring and support and targets to meet.
As far as I'd seen of him his teaching was to just pull out a set of materials that he'd been using year in year out since forever.and take the kids through them- not in any way matched to the kids' actual needs
The various managers started disciplinary proceedings, set what they thought were targets- which of course he met, because they were all performative. The managers involved were all of the exteachers-who-wanted-to-get away-from-teaching types. So had no idea what targets were meaningful
Targets set, targets met, Nothing changed. Rinse and repeat. For about 10-15 years!!!.
One year I was appointed his "mentor"- which is why I knew his targets were just shit.
Next time round I was the manager prosecuting. I've always taught and refused to join that office-bound type, even as a deputy head. I was always a teacher first and foremost.
So my targets were all about the quality of teaching and lesson planning with relevance to the target child. Rather than generic "Do planning" "record outcomes".
I specified that he had to demonstrate how his "planning" referred to the specific documented needs of the specific children on his case load*. That his "outcomes" measured how the child's learning had changed with regard to the defined needs. And so forth.
He was gone within two weeks ( some deal supported by the union, but with no pay-off or anything) - because I had him bang to rights. No bullying, nothing underhand. I just specified what his job was meant to be. What he was being paid to do. And what the schools/families of those kids had a right to expect. Because he just didn't have the skills or willingness to meet those professional targets (despite years of regular and expensive training!)..
*You'd have thought this was obvious, wouldn't you?? That's mangers for you, though.