Senior trashed me in my review Forum

[Anonymous User]

Anon for obvious reasons. I'm a junior at a V50 - non major market.

A senior I work very closely with and that has only ever had good things to say to me trashed me in my review. He has given me informal constructive feedback as we've worked together and I implemented the feedback as it came up. He even complimented me a couple times on making the adjustments and learning from my mistakes. Then in my review all of the same constructive feedback was there along with a pretty low score overall. All the other reviews I received were stellar, this was the only "negative"/constructive feedback one. I'm completely blindsided here and not sure how to take this. Feeling really down and upset. Am I overreacting or should I be worried?

[Anonymous User]

Anon for obvious reasons. I'm a junior at a V50 - non major market.

A senior I work very closely with and that has only ever had good things to say to me trashed me in my review. He has given me informal constructive feedback as we've worked together and I implemented the feedback as it came up. He even complimented me a couple times on making the adjustments and learning from my mistakes. Then in my review all of the same constructive feedback was there along with a pretty low score overall. All the other reviews I received were stellar, this was the only "negative"/constructive feedback one. I'm completely blindsided here and not sure how to take this. Feeling really down and upset. Am I overreacting or should I be worried?

You should practice a little cognitive behavioral therapy to get through this. Why would you be worried? Because you think you'll get fired? What evidence do you have for that other than this review? Do you know that people at your firm get fired because of one bad review? What is your evidence for that? Are you worried becuase you don't think you'll make partner now? In what universe would one review make the difference?

You're clearly placing a lot of your sense of self-worth in the way others perceive you at your firm, which is really not good. You should try to develop a more durable sense of self-esteem that doesn't give others so much power over you.

[Anonymous User]

delete

[Anonymous User]

It's possible he feels threatened by you and wants to stay as the intermediary between the partners and you and doesn't want them to start going to you directly as you become more senior.

It's possible that you've only partially fixed the issues he told you to work on, and he's the only one seeing it because he fixes it before it goes to the partners.

Hard to say as a random on the internet. Is it possible to avoid working with him in the future? If you're work isn't up to snuff in his mind, then he shouldn't be sad if you are making yourself busy on other people's matters.

But one bad review from another associate won't tank you, but you'll want to make sure you don't confirm whatever his complaints were when you work for other people.

[Anonymous User]

A friend of mine had a similar thing happen to him as a first year and it was a whole thing. A mid-level associate gave him god awful reviews. We're talking like won't respond to emails after 6:00, sends in work with multiple glaring typos, etc... All other reviews were positive and nice and constructive (as is typical for first years). Reviewing Partner, somewhat confused, followed up with the mid-level and suffice it to say the mid-level was having personal issues and had messed up on some stuff that was sent to his senior and was trying to offload some of the blame onto the junior he reviewed. From what I understand, the mid-level himself was late on lots of stuff and trying to share the blame with my friend. Anyways once that got sorted out everything was fine, although my friend left a year later for a clerkship and then went to government so like idk how this would have effected him 5 years down the line.

Not saying this is what happened to you, but thought I'd give some perspective. Me, personally, I feel like since this doesn't seem to be a Partner you're probably alright, especially since this one bad review can be contextualized with your other good reviews.

[Lawman1865]

Anon for obvious reasons. I'm a junior at a V50 - non major market.

A senior I work very closely with and that has only ever had good things to say to me trashed me in my review. He has given me informal constructive feedback as we've worked together and I implemented the feedback as it came up. He even complimented me a couple times on making the adjustments and learning from my mistakes. Then in my review all of the same constructive feedback was there along with a pretty low score overall. All the other reviews I received were stellar, this was the only "negative"/constructive feedback one. I'm completely blindsided here and not sure how to take this. Feeling really down and upset. Am I overreacting or should I be worried?

Very sorry that occurred. First, I don't think you should worry too much given that all other reviews were stellar. It's unfortunate that it's not great from everybody, but it sounds like the partners were hopefully happy to hear that you've generally done good work. As far as this particular associate, it IS unfortunate they did not caveat their constructive criticism with a qualifier that you have overcome those challenges, but I will mention that sometimes these reviews are solicited months in advance, so if you have made significant improvements on this senior associate's criticism in the intervening months, that may not be reflected in the review. This is what occurred with me in the past, and I actually asked the senior about it and it was indeed the case that they had given their review 5-6 months earlier, and they ended up speaking with the partner afterwards and assured them that I was presently doing good work, etc. I'm not saying you should do that here, I happened to feel comfortable to ask speak with the senior about it given our working relationship, but just sharing my experience.

[CanadianWolf]

Anon for obvious reasons. I'm a junior at a V50 - non major market.

A senior I work very closely with and that has only ever had good things to say to me trashed me in my review. He has given me informal constructive feedback as we've worked together and I implemented the feedback as it came up. He even complimented me a couple times on making the adjustments and learning from my mistakes. Then in my review all of the same constructive feedback was there along with a pretty low score overall. All the other reviews I received were stellar, this was the only "negative"/constructive feedback one. I'm completely blindsided here and not sure how to take this. Feeling really down and upset. Am I overreacting or should I be worried?

I think that you present the situation well in this brief one-paragraph post. Consider sharing your concern with the senior and with the partner. Otherwise, you should probably avoid working with Brutus in the future.

[Res Ipsa Loquitter]

Do you have any say in who your reviewers are? If yes, never pick them again. If it’s automatic after a certain number of hours, just refuse to work with them again. Yeah it’s risky to turn down work, but not as risky as horrible reviews that partners will read.

[Res Ipsa Loquitter]

Anon for obvious reasons. I'm a junior at a V50 - non major market.

A senior I work very closely with and that has only ever had good things to say to me trashed me in my review. He has given me informal constructive feedback as we've worked together and I implemented the feedback as it came up. He even complimented me a couple times on making the adjustments and learning from my mistakes. Then in my review all of the same constructive feedback was there along with a pretty low score overall. All the other reviews I received were stellar, this was the only "negative"/constructive feedback one. I'm completely blindsided here and not sure how to take this. Feeling really down and upset. Am I overreacting or should I be worried?

You should practice a little cognitive behavioral therapy to get through this. Why would you be worried? Because you think you'll get fired? What evidence do you have for that other than this review? Do you know that people at your firm get fired because of one bad review? What is your evidence for that? Are you worried becuase you don't think you'll make partner now? In what universe would one review make the difference?

You're clearly placing a lot of your sense of self-worth in the way others perceive you at your firm, which is really not good. You should try to develop a more durable sense of self-esteem that doesn't give others so much power over you.

I wouldn’t personally give a damn what some bitter senior thinks. The problem is that these reviews have real consequences

[Anonymous User]

Do you have any say in who your reviewers are? If yes, never pick them again. If it’s automatic after a certain number of hours, just refuse to work with them again. Yeah it’s risky to turn down work, but not as risky as horrible reviews that partners will read.

OP here- we have no say over who reviews us. I'm going to push back on working with this senior from now, appreciate the advice.

[attorney589753]

I agree with the basic advice to take a few breaths and try to relax before addressing the situation. It's basically unheard of for one person to cause a firing (if so, usually a rainmaker partner, not a senior associate), and combined with the other good reviews and general law firm staffing these days, you're definitely safe job-wise.

As one more perspective, at my old firm, the HR team (who put the reviews together) seemed basically compelled to always include constructive criticism. I can understand where they were coming from, but it was super annoying that a review which was overall 95% positive/5% negative and they tried to put extra emphasis on the negative part just to "prove" (or have a record?) that you weren't perfect. Like, duh, anyone who practices 2,000 hours of law in a year will have some days where they aren't on their "A game", be late responding to a few emails, etc.

Having said all that, in the calm light of post weekend (or however much time you need to cool off), I would consider next steps carefully. Do you *like* working with this senior associate? If so, then I think it's worth a direct conversation. Ask for 30 mins of their time. Come into the meeting with a quick summary: You appreciate their feedback, you appreciate that they feel comfortable sharing with you feedback, but the one thing that surprised you is that the overall review seemed to focus on areas already addressed. Do they still think you have work to do in that area?

If you don't like working with this senior then I agree it is best to overall avoid them going forward. This happened with me at my old firm; one person gave me an unfair review (from my POV) and I basically wrote them off going-forward. Still, you can probably learn from the situation. Sounds like some of their feedback was fair and true, although overly harsh and outdated. For me, I started thinking more about picking the right people to work with from the start, not being seduced by a "sexy assignment" (miserable with the wrong person), and tips for managing tough seniors more proactively.

Finally, note to senior associates: Don't be this person. My approach has always been to address feedback and performance issues with junior/mids one-on-one first. No one should ever hear something negative for the first time in a performance review. If the associate fixes whatever issue, then upper management never hears about it. Performance reviews are your chance to go to bat for good people. And you should really only call out repeat performance mistakes that associates had multiple chance to improve but did not.

[Anonymous User]

Agree with most others that this one bad review in a sea of good ones alone is nothing to worry about.

Just wanted to add that sometimes people just have different standards. When I first started working with this one partner, my work coordinator said not to be discouraged if his reviews were bad because he just has high expectations and everyone at the firm knows that. A 3/5 from this guy is worth a 5/5 from most others. Could be a little of that, too.

Also, as long as you're not getting universally bad reviews, reviews don't really matter until you're much more senior/up for partnership. Hold your head high, keep improving, and you're going to be fine.

[Anonymous User]

OP, I just wanted to come on here and provide some support as this has happened to me (very similar fact pattern) and it is a bad feeling. I think the advice from others to stop worrying about what people think about you is not all that helpful - how people view us is unfortunately an aspect of working at a law firm, and a stressful one at that. It sounds like you are doing a good job and have built up some credibility already, and that the outlier review will be treated as such.

[Lacepiece23]

Part of the job is realizing what and who are important. Just laugh this bullshit off. Who gives a shit what a senior associate has to say.

Hell, most firms don’t even care what junior partners/non-important equity partners have to say. It’s only when a bunch of the aforementioned people are saying the same thing that it matters.

If a big equity partner said this then yeah, might be time to worry a bit. This won’t affect you at all and can be a GOOD thing.

Id take the review straight to the senior associates office and say look at my other reviews and look at yours. I feel that maybe im just not a good fit for your cases/deals. Perhaps it’s best if we didn’t work together.

[Anonymous User]

Id take the review straight to the senior associates office and say look at my other reviews and look at yours. I feel that maybe im just not a good fit for your cases/deals. Perhaps it’s best if we didn’t work together.

Yeah don't do this. Could easily be taken as extremely insulting. Badmouthing coworkers higher on the pecking order to their face is universally a bad idea.

[Wild Card]

maybe the senior was commanded by the higher ups to trash you

the higher ups want to get rid of you, and they are piling up a bonfire of sins that they're going to burn you on

and then they will gaslight you to death

[Anonymous User]

OP, I just wanted to come on here and provide some support as this has happened to me (very similar fact pattern) and it is a bad feeling. I think the advice from others to stop worrying about what people think about you is not all that helpful - how people view us is unfortunately an aspect of working at a law firm, and a stressful one at that. It sounds like you are doing a good job and have built up some credibility already, and that the outlier review will be treated as such.

I don't think anybody is suggesting that appearances don't matter ever. It's just that one bad review from a senior probably doesn't.

But to your point, worrying about it and doing something about it are two different things. Worrying about it (like feeling badly, wondering what it means, posting on this forum about how to feel, stressing that you may get fired) is totally useless - OP shouldn't do it even for a second. There's no use crying over spilled milk. But doing something about it is different. That may mean talking to the senior about how to improve, focusing in on known areas of improvement, or something else - I don't know what's right here because I don't know the details of the review.

[12YrsAnAssociate]

Do you have any say in who your reviewers are? If yes, never pick them again. If it’s automatic after a certain number of hours, just refuse to work with them again. Yeah it’s risky to turn down work, but not as risky as horrible reviews that partners will read.

I got 2 mediocre reviews when I first started at my current firm and for the last 5 years I have 100% always been too busy to work for those 2 partners. Period. Hard stop. They have reached out at least 10 times each, and I'm always swamped, no matter what. At my firm if you do a certain number of hours of work for a person, they have the option to review you, but you can kindof steer the reviews by saying you did the work for a specific person. I always make sure to click the person that gives the best reviews if possible, though it's best to just avoid the bad reviewers.

[Res Ipsa Loquitter]

Do you have any say in who your reviewers are? If yes, never pick them again. If it’s automatic after a certain number of hours, just refuse to work with them again. Yeah it’s risky to turn down work, but not as risky as horrible reviews that partners will read.

I got 2 mediocre reviews when I first started at my current firm and for the last 5 years I have 100% always been too busy to work for those 2 partners. Period. Hard stop. They have reached out at least 10 times each, and I'm always swamped, no matter what. At my firm if you do a certain number of hours of work for a person, they have the option to review you, but you can kindof steer the reviews by saying you did the work for a specific person. I always make sure to click the person that gives the best reviews if possible, though it's best to just avoid the bad reviewers.

I think what some folks here are missing, especially if they’ve never been an associate before, is that most formal written feedback in a corporate environment is very sugarcoated

most bad associates are getting short, lukewarm reviews like “mostly responsive and helpful, good communication skills, should work on taking more ownership in future.” Hardly anyone (1) wants to spend the time to write the bad review or (2) deal with the potential fallout of their harsh review. Even if OP actually does suck, that review was totally weird and out of bounds.

[Anonymous User]

Do you have any say in who your reviewers are? If yes, never pick them again. If it’s automatic after a certain number of hours, just refuse to work with them again. Yeah it’s risky to turn down work, but not as risky as horrible reviews that partners will read.

I got 2 mediocre reviews when I first started at my current firm and for the last 5 years I have 100% always been too busy to work for those 2 partners. Period. Hard stop. They have reached out at least 10 times each, and I'm always swamped, no matter what. At my firm if you do a certain number of hours of work for a person, they have the option to review you, but you can kindof steer the reviews by saying you did the work for a specific person. I always make sure to click the person that gives the best reviews if possible, though it's best to just avoid the bad reviewers.

I think what some folks here are missing, especially if they’ve never been an associate before, is that most formal written feedback in a corporate environment is very sugarcoated

most bad associates are getting short, lukewarm reviews like “mostly responsive and helpful, good communication skills, should work on taking more ownership in future.” Hardly anyone (1) wants to spend the time to write the bad review or (2) deal with the potential fallout of their harsh review. Even if OP actually does suck, that review was totally weird and out of bounds.

It honestly depends on the person. When I have a bad junior, I don't waste my time on them. I sugarcoat the review and finish it up as quickly as possible because I don't have any time to waste on someone that doesn't care or isn't going to last long. These are generally the review like "Has a good attitude; should seek to gain more substantive knowledge". No details; all euphemisms.

I give real reviews to my best juniors. By real review, I mean constructive feedback that is actually actionable and can help them improve. It's pretty easy to tell who cares and who doesn't, and if you're showing me you care and want to be better, then I give you feedback that can help you. These reviews will be something like "great attention to detail - they were able to pick up several instances of blank in a complicated diligence exercise which saved the whole deal team significant time." "Should look to take more initiative - there were instances on email chains or during calls where they knew the answer but didn't speak up and instead messaged me on the side. I'd encourage them to speak up next time because they have the ability to do so."

I wouldn't call that "trashing you", and I know the firm doesn't believe that. I know they don't because I talk to seniors and partners all the time during the deal who ask me how the juniors are doing, and I let them know if someone is excellent or whatever.

When I was a junior, I got a couple of "bad" reviews too. Honestly, it can be hurtful. You think you killed it, were up for long hours and did an amazing job. Then you get someone telling you that you could have been better. That can sting. Add on to that that up until this point in your life, you've probably never truly received any negative feedback in your life. It's a shock.

But, I think it's important to understand the difference between someone just being an asshole and giving you a bad review vs. helpful feedback that you can improve on. No one is perfect and there's always something to improve on.

Based on OPs original post, I really don't have enough details to know whether his reviewer is a dick or OP is taking it too harshly.

[Anonymous User]

Do you have any say in who your reviewers are? If yes, never pick them again. If it’s automatic after a certain number of hours, just refuse to work with them again. Yeah it’s risky to turn down work, but not as risky as horrible reviews that partners will read.

I got 2 mediocre reviews when I first started at my current firm and for the last 5 years I have 100% always been too busy to work for those 2 partners. Period. Hard stop. They have reached out at least 10 times each, and I'm always swamped, no matter what. At my firm if you do a certain number of hours of work for a person, they have the option to review you, but you can kindof steer the reviews by saying you did the work for a specific person. I always make sure to click the person that gives the best reviews if possible, though it's best to just avoid the bad reviewers.

I think what some folks here are missing, especially if they’ve never been an associate before, is that most formal written feedback in a corporate environment is very sugarcoated

most bad associates are getting short, lukewarm reviews like “mostly responsive and helpful, good communication skills, should work on taking more ownership in future.” Hardly anyone (1) wants to spend the time to write the bad review or (2) deal with the potential fallout of their harsh review. Even if OP actually does suck, that review was totally weird and out of bounds.

It honestly depends on the person. When I have a bad junior, I don't waste my time on them. I sugarcoat the review and finish it up as quickly as possible because I don't have any time to waste on someone that doesn't care or isn't going to last long. These are generally the review like "Has a good attitude; should seek to gain more substantive knowledge". No details; all euphemisms.

I give real reviews to my best juniors. By real review, I mean constructive feedback that is actually actionable and can help them improve. It's pretty easy to tell who cares and who doesn't, and if you're showing me you care and want to be better, then I give you feedback that can help you. These reviews will be something like "great attention to detail - they were able to pick up several instances of blank in a complicated diligence exercise which saved the whole deal team significant time." "Should look to take more initiative - there were instances on email chains or during calls where they knew the answer but didn't speak up and instead messaged me on the side. I'd encourage them to speak up next time because they have the ability to do so."

I wouldn't call that "trashing you", and I know the firm doesn't believe that. I know they don't because I talk to seniors and partners all the time during the deal who ask me how the juniors are doing, and I let them know if someone is excellent or whatever.

When I was a junior, I got a couple of "bad" reviews too. Honestly, it can be hurtful. You think you killed it, were up for long hours and did an amazing job. Then you get someone telling you that you could have been better. That can sting. Add on to that that up until this point in your life, you've probably never truly received any negative feedback in your life. It's a shock.

But, I think it's important to understand the difference between someone just being an asshole and giving you a bad review vs. helpful feedback that you can improve on. No one is perfect and there's always something to improve on.

Based on OPs original post, I really don't have enough details to know whether his reviewer is a dick or OP is taking it too harshly.

Idk man. If you have real constructive feedback, tell me in person. Don't put it in writing where it can hurt me.

[Monochromatic Oeuvre]

It honestly depends on the person. When I have a bad junior, I don't waste my time on them. I sugarcoat the review and finish it up as quickly as possible because I don't have any time to waste on someone that doesn't care or isn't going to last long. These are generally the review like "Has a good attitude; should seek to gain more substantive knowledge". No details; all euphemisms.

I give real reviews to my best juniors. By real review, I mean constructive feedback that is actually actionable and can help them improve. It's pretty easy to tell who cares and who doesn't, and if you're showing me you care and want to be better, then I give you feedback that can help you. These reviews will be something like "great attention to detail - they were able to pick up several instances of blank in a complicated diligence exercise which saved the whole deal team significant time." "Should look to take more initiative - there were instances on email chains or during calls where they knew the answer but didn't speak up and instead messaged me on the side. I'd encourage them to speak up next time because they have the ability to do so."

I wouldn't call that "trashing you", and I know the firm doesn't believe that. I know they don't because I talk to seniors and partners all the time during the deal who ask me how the juniors are doing, and I let them know if someone is excellent or whatever.

When I was a junior, I got a couple of "bad" reviews too. Honestly, it can be hurtful. You think you killed it, were up for long hours and did an amazing job. Then you get someone telling you that you could have been better. That can sting. Add on to that that up until this point in your life, you've probably never truly received any negative feedback in your life. It's a shock.

But, I think it's important to understand the difference between someone just being an asshole and giving you a bad review vs. helpful feedback that you can improve on. No one is perfect and there's always something to improve on.

Based on OPs original post, I really don't have enough details to know whether his reviewer is a dick or OP is taking it too harshly.

So you tell the firm the bad juniors are doing great and the good ones need to fix XYZ?

Above post is correct; criticism that goes through a third party is by definition not constructive.

If Junior X makes my life easier, I tell the partners how great X is and that we should staff X on our deals and do whatever we can to keep X happy so they stay around. If they don’t, when it comes to staffing I suggest Y or Z instead and X’s name never comes up.

[Res Ipsa Loquitter]

It honestly depends on the person. When I have a bad junior, I don't waste my time on them. I sugarcoat the review and finish it up as quickly as possible because I don't have any time to waste on someone that doesn't care or isn't going to last long. These are generally the review like "Has a good attitude; should seek to gain more substantive knowledge". No details; all euphemisms.

I give real reviews to my best juniors. By real review, I mean constructive feedback that is actually actionable and can help them improve. It's pretty easy to tell who cares and who doesn't, and if you're showing me you care and want to be better, then I give you feedback that can help you. These reviews will be something like "great attention to detail - they were able to pick up several instances of blank in a complicated diligence exercise which saved the whole deal team significant time." "Should look to take more initiative - there were instances on email chains or during calls where they knew the answer but didn't speak up and instead messaged me on the side. I'd encourage them to speak up next time because they have the ability to do so."

I wouldn't call that "trashing you", and I know the firm doesn't believe that. I know they don't because I talk to seniors and partners all the time during the deal who ask me how the juniors are doing, and I let them know if someone is excellent or whatever.

When I was a junior, I got a couple of "bad" reviews too. Honestly, it can be hurtful. You think you killed it, were up for long hours and did an amazing job. Then you get someone telling you that you could have been better. That can sting. Add on to that that up until this point in your life, you've probably never truly received any negative feedback in your life. It's a shock.

But, I think it's important to understand the difference between someone just being an asshole and giving you a bad review vs. helpful feedback that you can improve on. No one is perfect and there's always something to improve on.

Based on OPs original post, I really don't have enough details to know whether his reviewer is a dick or OP is taking it too harshly.

So you tell the firm the bad juniors are doing great and the good ones need to fix XYZ?

Above post is correct; criticism that goes through a third party is by definition not constructive.

If Junior X makes my life easier, I tell the partners how great X is and that we should staff X on our deals and do whatever we can to keep X happy so they stay around. If they don’t, when it comes to staffing I suggest Y or Z instead and X’s name never comes up.

He rewards his best juniors by putting negative information into their reviews… that’s wild. Regardless of his intentions, once that info is in the hands of HR and partners, they can and will use it for any nefarious purpose they’d like. Think I’d be avoiding Mr. “Real Reviews are for my Besties” like the plague.

[RedNewJersey]

I apparently have a weird view on this, but to me it seems completely normal to flag issues that occurred during a review period in a person's review. That's the point of a review. If you fixed them, great, they won't recur in the next review period. But they did occur here (it's like getting questions wrong on a midterm or quiz and expecting that not to affect your final grade because you learned it by the end).

Also, to be honest, people let a huge amount of things go without saying anything, so if I had given constructive feedback to the same person multiple times, that would be highly likely to go into their review. Plus, as long as it's truthful and done in good faith, the formal review process is the ideal place for feedback so that it can be aggregated.

That said, many people do not engage in the review process in that spirit, and just try to game it ridiculously by having all glowing reviews based on who they pick to review them (or, from the other side, say nice things about their friends and mean things about people they want to get rid of). If that's the goal, somebody who is just trying to do a normal review will look crazy and harsh. That seems like what happened.

[Anonymous User]

I apparently have a weird view on this, but to me it seems completely normal to flag issues that occurred during a review period in a person's review. That's the point of a review. If you fixed them, great, they won't recur in the next review period. But they did occur here (it's like getting questions wrong on a midterm or quiz and expecting that not to affect your final grade because you learned it by the end).

Also, to be honest, people let a huge amount of things go without saying anything, so if I had given constructive feedback to the same person multiple times, that would be highly likely to go into their review. Plus, as long as it's truthful and done in good faith, the formal review process is the ideal place for feedback so that it can be aggregated.

That said, many people do not engage in the review process in that spirit, and just try to game it ridiculously by having all glowing reviews based on who they pick to review them (or, from the other side, say nice things about their friends and mean things about people they want to get rid of). If that's the goal, somebody who is just trying to do a normal review will look crazy and harsh. That seems like what happened.

This is just not how things work in real life. A review isn't for real feedback, it's a record for HR. If you think someone is overall a good associate who should be kept on, keep it positive.