At our January ASCE YMF General Body Meeting (GBM), we took the time to discuss how our different engineering organizations approach goal-setting and progress reports -- basically, how do you know if you are doing a good job? Here are some snippets from our conversation:

Haley & Aldrich: Has a formal review process and good infrastructure to support it. Every quarter you do a formal review with your manager and document and track what you've learned and how you're growing. There is an intratnet site that staff use to track progress. Very goal oriented.

FTF Engineering: Annual review process once a year; can be overwhelming as it's just once a year so you have to look back at the entire year as a whole. Time consuming.

COWI: Formal review process, but the infrastructure is not very good - there is a word document macro that is hard to use.

Brown and Caldwell: Has a formal review process and good infrastructure to support it. Quarterly formal reviews, and an intranet site that staff use to track progress. Goal oriented.

Arup: Similar to Haley & Aldrich and Brown and Caldwell in that it is very goal-oriented; in addition, there is a program called "Invest in Arup" where staff can apply for internal grants to perform independent research.

CalTrans: Informal review process; every few months, you meet and discuss with your supervisor on your progress. However, there is a rotational program for all new employees that lasts three years, so you get a good sense of different aspects of the company and what you're good at by getting to try out three different positions.

KWP: Small company (about 30 people), so no formal review program, but it is ingrained in the culture. About once a quarter you'll go out to lunch with your supervisor and discuss.

HDR: No formal review process, but you talk with your manager often and receive feedback.

E|2: No formal review process, but it is part of the company culture to give feedback when needed.

BKF: The review process was part of the company infrastructure, but depending on your manager you could have more of a hands-off management or an active and engaging program. However, there is an internal social media site where staff can discuss various technical issues throughout the company and it is very helpful for young staff to get an idea of what the company is like.

KPFF: No formal review process, but you typically meet up with your PMs about once a month to check in on work progress.

Please feel free to comment on this post to add information about how your company handles goal-setting and reviewing/ giving performance feedback!