Prep for a hard performance review conversation
Walk in with the actual argument, not just a feeling that the rating is wrong.
- Use it for
- Anyone about to have a performance conversation they expect to disagree with.
Walking into a review with "I don't think this rating is fair" loses before it starts, because it's a feeling, and a feeling is easy for a manager to acknowledge and move past without anything changing. What actually shifts a conversation is specific evidence connected to the stated criteria — the thing you did, the outcome it produced, and why that maps to a higher bar than the one you got. Most people have that evidence somewhere but haven't organized it into an argument before walking into the room.
This prompt exists to do that organizing in advance, including the uncomfortable part: thinking through how the manager will actually respond, so you're not improvising a counter-argument in real time while also managing how you feel about the conversation.
When not to use this
This is for building an argument, not for processing the disappointment first — do that separately, with a person, before you're ready to think clearly about evidence. And it won't manufacture a case that isn't there; if the honest answer is that the rating is defensible, better to find that out here than in the room.
Did this work?
You walk in with two or three specific, evidence-backed points instead of a general sense of unfairness — and you've already thought through the manager's likely counter to each one.
Tested on claude-opus-5. Evidence status is draft; it moves to battle-tested only on recorded runs, never by hand.