Performance Appraisals

*SELF-ASSESSMENT DEADLINE FOR 2025: Friday, November 14, 2025*

The performance appraisal process at Canisius University is designed to encourage open discussion between supervisors and their employees to review progress, establish priorities and discuss career development opportunities across the campus. The first step in this process is to complete your self-assessment.  As part of the process, we encourage you to consider the following tips in preparing your self-assessment.

Self-Assessment Preparation Tips

Gather your thoughts- Self-assessment is a critical tool for fostering conversation and improving communication with your managers and peers. Self-assessment provide employees with the opportunity to analyze your strengths and weaknesses in the context of a formal performance appraisal.  Discuss what important projects have been completed, share new skills and techniques acquired and highlight work that has been done since the last performance appraisal.

Be confident- The main goal of self-assessment is to highlight your accomplishments. Employees need to ensure that the work they are most proud of is highlighted in the self-assessment. Point to specific tasks and projects that highlight your best work. When describing those accomplishments, be sure to emphasize the impact each of those achievements had on the University as a whole. Accomplishments listed should connect with University’s Strategic Plan.

Be concise- While employees might be inclined to write about each step of the successful project or task, it's best to be brief. The work should stand on its own.

Be honest- Honesty is another critical aspect of writing a self-assessment. It's more than likely that the manager knows when a good job was done, so trying to highlight a project or task that was just OK, rather than great, won't have much impact. Part of being honest also means pointing out some areas that could be improved.

Think about career development -Use self-assessment as a time to communicate career development interests. Be proactive- if you don't ask, it likely won't happen.

Be professional- Employees need to always be professional when writing a self-assessment. This means not using it as an opportunity to be negative towards your manager for poor leadership skills or criticize co-workers for making their life more difficult.

Communicate openly with your manager- Finally, if the performance appraisal process reveals weaknesses that may be holding you back, don't be afraid to ask for help. Like discussing your weaknesses, asking for constructive feedback from supervisors can help cultivate strong work relationships.

Important Notes Regarding the Performance Appraisal System in Electronic Forms:

• The employee can save their input without submitting it to their supervisor by clicking on Save Progress.  They can return to the form as necessary until they are satisfied with their input by using the original link in the email. 

• There is a 45-minute timer in the upper corner of the page.  The form will time out and a warning message will be displayed at the 43-minute mark.    When you are ready to submit your self-assessment to your supervisor, you click Next and electronically sign their assessment. 

• After the employee has completed and signed their assessment, the employee can choose to view the form as a PDF by clicking the button that says View Form PDF.   This will open a new tab in the browser window and then the employee can save it to their files from that browser window.

• When the employee signs off on their self-assessment, an email is sent to their supervisor informing them to review the employee’s self-assessment and to complete their section of the form.

• Once the supervisor completes and signs their section, the employee will receive one more email to acknowledge and sign off on the final performance appraisal.

Athletic Coaching Staff Performance Appraisals:

As of 5/17/2023, a separate appraisal process was implemented for the coaching staff only.   The Dynamic Form is called HR Appraisal Form (Athletic Coaches).   The process is the same, but the questions differ.  An email will be sent out separately to coaches with the correct form.