The annual performance review often carries an unspoken message: do more, aim higher, move faster. Even when it’s well-intentioned, the structure of many reviews reinforces the idea that progress only counts if it looks like promotion, expanded scope, or visible stretch.
What’s often missing is permission to embed, deepen, and pause.
For many professionals, sustainable capability isn’t built through constant acceleration. It’s built by staying with something long enough to properly master it.
When “What’s Next?” Dominates the Conversation
Reviews are commonly framed around questions like:
What’s next?
Where are you pushing yourself?
How can you stretch further this year?
These are reasonable questions — just not all the time, and not for everyone.
When performance conversations lean too heavily towards forward motion, several things can happen. People feel pressure to outgrow roles before they’ve fully grown into them. Expertise that looks steady rather than expansive can be overlooked. Quiet confidence and consistency are often mistaken for a lack of ambition. Over time, people begin to equate worth with movement, rather than contribution.
The cost isn’t a lack of drive. It’s the absence of space to consolidate.
Plateaus Are Part of Professional Growth
One of the most useful re-frames leaders can offer is this: plateaus are part of the process.
A plateau isn’t stagnation. It’s often where judgement sharpens, confidence steadies, and decision-making becomes calmer and more assured. Skills move from conscious effort to instinct. Trust builds — with peers, clients, and leadership.
These phases don’t always produce obvious “new” outputs, but they are where depth is formed. Without them, progression becomes fragile.
If reviews don’t acknowledge this, people can quietly feel that staying put equals falling behind.
When Progress Isn’t a Promotion
In many organisations, it simply isn’t possible to promote everyone or offer regular pay rises. When reviews implicitly treat these as the primary markers of success, disappointment becomes almost inevitable — for both leaders and team members.
This is where performance conversations need to broaden their definition of recognition.
People need to know they are seen not only for where they might go next, but for the expertise they’ve built, the stability they bring, the standards they hold, and the consistency of their contribution.
When this isn’t named, it’s often assumed it isn’t noticed.
“Progress doesn’t always look like movement. Sometimes it looks like steadiness.”
Creating Space for a Different Conversation
A more balanced review creates room for listening, not just driving.
Leaders — and individuals — might experiment with questions such as:
What skills now feel embedded or instinctive in my role?
Where do I feel more confident or grounded than I did before?
What am I deepening rather than expanding right now?
What kind of recognition helps me feel valued at this stage?
Where might staying put be the most sensible move?
These questions legitimise consolidation as a form of progress.
A Broader Measure of Success
A good performance review shouldn’t leave someone feeling they need to keep proving themselves again and again.
At its best, it affirms what is already working, acknowledges effort that has become invisible through competence, and creates clarity about what matters now — not just what comes next.
Sometimes, the most valuable thing a review can do is recognise depth, steadiness, and maturity — and make it clear that these count.
PS: This article is part of a bi-weekly email series explaining the leadership questions in the Architect’s Leadership Journal. You can join this email series here.