The managers are under intense pressure to adhere to the distribution that requires 40% of employees to be rated below expectations.

I don't know if our eval policy is that strict, but all the managers do get a stern "Not all of your employees are above expectations" email every year.

And that reminds me, I still haven't done my self-eval which is due Monday. Oops.

it sounds like he may have suspected you were put in an impossible situation and took pity.

Exactly. I'll take it where I can get it when dealing with Mean Dean.

I would be suspicious that they are gearing up for a RIF,

Nope, they don't have control over that. The staffing plan is set by the main contract and if the subcontract wanted to lose positions (which they don't, this is a small but prestigious contract for them, less than 10% of main contract,) main would just take the positions back. And we know exactly what staffing plans look like over the next while.

The faculty probably realizes you were put on the spot.

That is a ridiculous policy! We are tiny and don't do evaluations. If people aren't up to expectations I work with them to get them up to expectations or get rid of them.

Speaking of work, I really need to get my butt out the door and to the office....

I realize it is likely a common corporate thing, but really, it doesn't fit the culture here at all and has been pissing off the main contract folk for a bit. I expect the all hands meeting with the corporate overlords to be ugly. Hell, I might just make it ugly.

More adventures in recruiting. The recruiter has passed on a message from a client, who wants to know how long it would take me to write "a blog".

Oh dear.

how long it would take me to write "a blog".

Prepare for a follow-up question about whether you can make "a Facebook" for them.

The managers are under intense pressure to adhere to the distribution that requires 40% of employees to be rated below expectations.

We're pretty hardcore on rating distributions but that's way out there.