“No more wire hangers, ever!” was the fantastic line used by the ultra-scary Faye Dunaway as she portrayed the screen legend, Joan Crawford in one of my all time movie favorites, Mommie Dearest. Whatever expectations I had about becoming a mother, there is no way I could do as poor a job as that nutty Joan Crawford! She set the bar really low for us, thankfully, as we clueless folk embark on this baffling journey we call parenthood.
My first job out of college was working for one of the Big Six consulting firms (or was it the big ten or big three—I can’t remember, and they have all either merged or been acquired by now so who is really counting in the first place?) This meant that, with my Communications and Business degree, I had no skills whatsoever, but this great corporation took it on faith that I could be indoctrinated into the culture and they could mold me into a coding machine to maximize my billable hours for the next five to ten years until I either made partner or became too disgruntled with the travel and zero balance lifestyle that I quit. One thing this company took seriously and got right, in my opinion, was the performance evaluations. We, as green beans, relied totally on formal supervisor feedback four times a year so that we would not embarrass ourselves and our consulting firm in front of the client and we would actually demonstrate that we were 900 percent more productive and efficient than the clients working side by side with us on our projects.
Now that I have been in the parenting game for almost ten years, I think that I am really due for a performance evaluation. Overdue, actually. While the part remains fuzzy on who would administer such a review, I contend that most parents would relish the chance for someone to give them honest feedback on their strengths, areas of development, and actionable steps to get to “the next level.” I think this might be especially helpful for single parents or parents with pre-teens and teens who, I am warned, morph into selfish, arrogant, angry strangers for a few years. I also think it is helpful for two parents that “agree to disagree” on a few parenting areas—what better way to break the tie than to have an objective person give a few points of feedback to provide more context and perspective on a child rearing matter?
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