What should I look for when all I have to go by is a wall of text with tens (or even hundreds) of words that manage to say nothing?
When it’s plagued with buzzwords like “discipline consistently”, “running system versus reading the diff”, “scaffold repro harnesses”, “token-driven”…
I want to know what you learned, in your own words…
In a time when AI has made our job so much quicker, and sterile even, I think the human part is still way more important: I want to see and understand what you learned while working on these projects.
Not what the next most predictable token is.
These reviews should serve as place of reflection. Instead, it seems it’s become just one more performative task. One more thing to just get out of the way.
They are truly useful when done right — when there is actual thought put into them.
Now, I have to go through a wall of text that’s loud, but doesn’t have any substance. If wanted to simply know what you did, to know what you completed and whatnot, I could pull all that from GitHub and have Claude summarize it.
But that doesn’t tell me how you are growing as a professional.
I’m supposed to lead, to coach.
It feels like playing pool with a single hand; the other one tied behind my back.
I may hit it right, but it’s going to take countless attempts before I do if you hide your true learnings behind a curtain of smart words.