STAFF APPRAISAL EXERCISE¹

Reporting period 1 January to 31 December 2003

The appraisal exercise covering the 2003 calendar year is the second one under the new system introduced in April 2002. In consultation with the Staff Regulations Committee and the Central Staff Committee and following concertation with the trade unions and staff organisations, the Commission adopted new general provisions for implementing Article 43 of the Staff Regulations on 3 March 2004. This Administrative Notice gives details of the changes introduced by the new implementing provisions and explains the various stages of the appraisal procedure.

• GENERAL PRINCIPLES

• MAIN DIFFERENCES FROM THE PREVIOUS APPRAISAL EXERCISE

• SUCCESSIVE STAGES OF THE APPRAISAL EXERCISE

• WHAT ARE THE IMPLICATIONS OF THE NEW IMPLEMENTING RULES FOR DIRECTORATES-GENERAL THAT HAVE ALREADY STARTED THE APPRAISAL EXERCISE?

• FURTHER INFORMATION

1. GENERAL PRINCIPLES
   
   The appraisal exercise will be based on the career development report (CDR). You can see the layout of the report form at
   http://www.cc.cec/pers_admin/promotions/forms/forms_en.html
   Career development reports are drawn up using the Sysper2 computer application. Each jobholder receives merit points in the range 0 to 20.

• What are the implementing rules?
  
  Reports for 2003 are governed by the general provisions implementing Article 43 of the Staff Regulations adopted by the Commission on 3 March 2004
  http://www.cc.cec/pers_admin/promotions/index_en.html#5
  However, partial and interim reports which should have been drawn up in 2003 are covered by the old provisions.
   

• What period does the new appraisal exercise cover?
  
  The reference period runs from 1 January to 31 December 2003.
   

• Who has to be appraised and receive a CDR?

• All officials and some members of the temporary staff² who were on active service or on secondment in the interests of the service for a continuous period of at least one month during the year 2003 have to be appraised.

• Exceptions: a report does not have to be drafted for jobholders³ who left the Community institutions in 2003 or who are going to leave in 2004, unless they expressly request one.

• What does the appraisal relate to?
  
  As in the previous exercise, the appraisal consists of three sections:

• Efficiency is marked out of 10: as individual objectives for 2003 were set for all jobholders, your performance will be assessed according to how far you have achieved your objectives in your work.
   

• Abilities (competencies) are marked out of six. DG ADMIN has established a standard scale applicable to all Commission departments:
  http://www.cc.cec/home/admref/cdr/documentation/competency_framework_en.pdf Account also has to be taken of the more specific abilities linked to the kind of job you do, and, if you are a manager, of your leadership qualities and your financial and human resource management skills.
   

• Conduct in the service covers aspects such as working with others, motivation and service culture and is marked out of four.

If objectives could not be set for 2003 for all the tasks you perform, your performance will be evaluated partly with reference to your job description or existing planning, of which you will be aware. If the list of job-specific competencies and other job requirements has not been established for some reason, appraisal of your abilities and conduct will be based primarily on the competency and conduct framework, where appropriate together with appraisal standards established at the start of the reporting period.
http://www.cc.cec/home/admref/cdr/documentation/competency_framework_en.pdf 

2. MAIN DIFFERENCES FROM THE PREVIOUS APPRAISAL EXERCISE
   
   The main changes introduced by the new general implementing provisions are as follows:

• For probationary officials: where the probationary period ends after 31 January 2004, a CDR is not required, only a probationary report. The procedure to be followed is laid down in Article 34 of the Staff Regulations: one month at the latest before the expiry of the probationary period, the line manager draws up a report, which is communicated to the probationer. If the report concludes that the probationer is to be dismissed or the probationary period extended, the appointing authority has to consult the Joint Reports Committee. The appeal procedures provided for under the CDR system do not apply to probationary reports. The probationary report form is similar to the CDR one, but does not include merit points. These are awarded once the probationary period has been successfully completed. Their number is fixed: nine for categories A and B and six for categories C and D.
   

• While still remaining the official reporting officer, a head of unit may delegate the preparatory work relating to the appraisal of jobholders in his/her unit to a suitable official in the unit.
   

• Where the unit head shares the same grade as the jobholder, the countersigning officer will take part in the dialogue if the jobholder, reporting officer or countersigning officer so requests. The countersigning officer must indicate his/her remarks in the appropriate place on the report. The Joint Evaluation Committee pays particular attention to appeals lodged by jobholders of the same grade as their reporting officer. If, following such an appeal, the Joint Evaluation Committee fails to issue an opinion or to issue a unanimous opinion, the appeal assessor must hold a dialogue with the jobholder before confirming or amending the report.
   

• A special appeal procedure was introduced under Commission Decision of 4 April 2002 on raising concerns about serious wrongdoings for whistle-blowers awarded at least one merit point less than in their preceding report. In such cases the appeal assessor is the Director-General of the Directorate-General for Personnel and Administration or the Secretary-General of the Commission.
   

• If you are seconded in the interests of the service or temporarily assigned to another department, your CDR will be drawn up by your DG of origin. It will ask the host department to hold the dialogue and prepare a draft report, which will not contain your merit points. These will be awarded by your Directorate-General of origin in the light of the appraisal standards applying in that DG.
   

• If you are elected, appointed or delegated to perform staff representation functions, you must give the relevant details in your self-assessment and make a clear distinction between your staff representation and other professional activities. Your reporting officer and countersigning officer have to refer the part of your self-assessment relating to staff representation activities to the ad hoc Group. Once they have received the Group's opinion, your reporting officer will invite you to the formal dialogue.
   

• At the dialogue, the reporting officer has to give you an indication, in the form of a range of up to one point between two marks, of the mark you will be awarded. However, this does not mean that your final mark will definitely be within this range because it has first to be validated by the countersigning officer.
   

• Two new phases have been included in the appraisal procedure (see point III below): concertation between the reporting officers and the countersigning officer and between the countersigning officers and the Director-General. These two stages take place after the formal dialogues have been held and before the reports are finalised. Their purpose is to ensure that the approach to appraisals is standardised, based on individual merit assessment and standards set for the Directorate-General.
   

• The composition of the Joint Evaluation Committees has been revised: the committee for the Directorate-General — or Directorates-General where it is common to several departments — will be chaired by a Director from another Directorate-General. On the administration side there will be one external and one internal member. To reach a quorum, the chairperson or the external member must be present. In the absence of the chairperson, the external member will chair the committee. Another change is that when the JEC has adopted an opinion, the number of votes for and against will be communicated to the appeal assessor.
   

• The model for the CDR — which is attached to the detailed implementing rules adopted by the Commission — has been changed to allow half-points to be awarded for the three sections of the CDR.
  http://www.cc.cec/pers_admin/promotions/forms/forms_en.html

A number of changes have also been made to Sysper 2:

• When a jobholder, reporting officer and countersigning officer agree that the previous report is to be carried over, the procedure is deemed to have been completed without all the stages having actually to be gone through. In particular the jobholder will not be required to write a self-assessment. If the report covers a whole year, the reporting officer must, however, hold a dialogue with the jobholder to set objectives and agree the training map.
   

• Sysper 2 will send automatically generated e-mail messages to jobholders each time they are required to take some action in the procedure such as write a self-assessment, indicate whether they accept their report, and to remind them of the various deadlines.

3. SUCCESSIVE STAGES OF THE APPRAISAL EXERCISE
   
   In most DGs the appraisal exercise for 2003 is already in progress. As the new implementing rules have only just been adopted, the deadline for finalising CDRs for 2003 is the end of May. There are special deadlines for staff in the external service. A separate Notice will be issued for them.

• Who acts as reporting officer, countersigning officer and appeal assessor?
  
  As a rule the reporting officer is your head of unit, the countersigning officer the Director, and the appeal assessor the Director-General.
  
  The reporting officer will be the person who was your head of unit on 31 December 2003. The duties of countersigning officer and appeal assessor are performed by the Director and Director-General at the time they are called upon to play a role in the procedure.
   

• What are the stages in the appraisal procedure?
  
  As in the previous exercise, the appraisal procedure will be managed by the Sysper 2 computer application. If you have no possibility of access to Sysper 2, you may use other forms of written communication.
  
  The stages of the appraisal procedure are as follows⁴:

• Publication by DG ADMIN of statistics on the previous appraisal and promotion exercises
  
  These statistics were published in Administrative Notice No 1-2004 of 12 January 2004,
   

• Definition of appraisal standards

In the previous appraisal exercise the Directorates-General drew up appraisal standards. The Director-General has to review these and, if appropriate, update them in consultation with the Directors and heads of unit and communicate them to staff. These standards are established on the basis of the competency framework applicable to all Commission staff and designed to harmonise appraisal within any particular Directorate-General.
http://www.cc.cec/home/admref/cdr/documentation/competency_framework_en.pdf

• The self-assessment
  
  When asked to do so by your reporting officer, you have to write your self-assessment within eight working days. Your are strongly recommended to refer to the appraisal standards at this crucial stage.
   

• The formal dialogue
  
  Not more than ten days after you communicate your self-assessment, the reporting officer will hold a dialogue with you to discuss your performance in 2003, set objectives and agree your training map for 2004.
  
  The self-assessment and the appraisal standards set for the Directorate-General must be systematically discussed during the dialogue.
  
  The reporting officer must give you some indication of the merit points you are to be awarded, in the form of a range of up to one point between two marks.
  
  The objectives that are set for 2004 must reflect your working conditions (taking factors such as part-time, secondment, etc. into account) and must be consistent with the work programme of your Directorate-General and unit.
  
  The reporting officer will then draft your report.
   

• The two concertation phases
  
  As mentioned above, once at least two thirds of the CDRs have been drafted for a given grade in a Directorate, the countersigning officer has to meet the reporting officers to compare and harmonise the merit points provisionally awarded.
  
  The Director-General also meets the countersigning officers to perform a similar check at Directorate-General level.
   

• The career development review is drawn up
  
  After these concertations, the reporting officer and the countersigning officer finalise the CDR. The jobholder is informed of this and has five working days in which to accept the report without comment, to accept it in full after adding some comments, or to refuse to accept it, stating the reason(s) for doing so.
   

• Appeal channels
  
  If you refuse to accept your report, the countersigning officer must hold a second dialogue with you, within ten working days. You may be accompanied at the dialogue by another official. The jobholder, the reporting officer or the countersigning officer may also request that the reporting officer be present at the second dialogue. After this dialogue the countersigning officer confirms the report or amends it within five working days. You will be notified of the report and will have ten working days in which to indicate whether you accept it. If you do not accept it you are required to give your reasons.
  
  Refusal to accept your report at this stage automatically means that it will be referred to the Joint Evaluation Committee. There is a Joint Evaluation Committee (JEC) for each Directorate-General⁵. The JEC considers appeals within ten working days. It does not replace either the reporting officer or the countersigning officer but checks that the procedure has been complied with and that the report has been drawn up in accordance with the appraisal standards laid down for the Directorate-General concerned.
  
  The JEC’s opinion will be notified to the jobholder, the reporting officer, the countersigning officer and the appeal assessor. If it was voted on, the notification will state how many votes there were for and against. Within five days the appeal assessor has to confirm or amend the report. The appeal assessor must give reasons for a decision that departs from the recommendations contained in the JEC’s opinion.
  
  The report is then closed and the jobholder notified. If at this stage of the procedure you still do not accept the report, you can make a complaint to the appointing authority under Article 90 of the Staff Regulations.

4. WHAT ARE THE IMPLICATIONS OF THE NEW IMPLEMENTING RULES FOR DIRECTORATES-GENERAL THAT HAVE ALREADY STARTED THE APPRAISAL EXERCISE?
   
   The Directorate-General for Personnel and Administration had asked the departments which launched the appraisal exercise in January not to proceed to the stages of the procedure beyond the formal dialogue between the reporting officer and the jobholder. It stressed that, except in cases of carryovers, reports could not be finalised until the new general provisions for implementing Article 43 had been adopted.
   
   Jobholders whose reports were closed before 3 March 2004 other than in the case of carryovers and those who have lodged an appeal may request, before 19 March, that the appraisal exercise be restarted.
   
   Similarly, a new dialogue attended by the countersigning officer will have to be held for jobholders who share the same grade as their reporting officer, if the jobholder, reporting officer or countersigning officer so requests before 19 March.
   
   Lastly, where the formal dialogue has already taken place but the report not yet communicated to the jobholder, the reporting officer will have to communicate the range of merit points orally.
    

5. FURTHER INFORMATION
   
   Further information can be found at:
   http://www.cc.cec/pers_admin/promotions/index_en.html

FOOTNOTES
¹ The appraisal exercise concerns all grades except A1 and A2.
²Temporary staff covered by the research budget (Article 2(d) of the Conditions of employment of other servants of the European Communities), temporary staff covered by the administrative budget temporarily filling a permanent post (Article 2(a)) and temporary staff assigned to Commissioners’ private offices (Article 2(c)).
³ A “jobholder” can be an official or a member of the temporary staff within the meaning of Articles 2(a), (c) or (d) of the Conditions of employment of other servants of the European Communities.
⁴ See also point II above.
⁵Under the new implementing rules adopted by the Commission a joint evaluation committee common to a number of Directorates-General may be set up subject to certain conditions.