If someone tells you you have to spend 20-30 hours (or more) building your performance appraisal skills training from scratch, pause.
Take a breath. Lean in.
There is a more innovative, learner-centered, and more impactful way to lead these conversations.
Here’s the truth: You already know that training for managers and leaders on performance appraisals matters.
Studies show that when managers are clear on how to evaluate fairly, provide constructive feedback, and align performance with growth, the entire team benefits.
But what often gets lost is this: You don’t have to start from zero.
You don’t need to reinvent the wheel.
What you do need is a high-quality framework, solid materials, and the freedom to add your own voice — your unique style, your organisational context.
That’s where our product comes in.
Why you can stop building from scratch
- Time is limited: Imagine putting 20-30 hours (yes, the revised figure) into designing layers of content, slides, activities, handouts, and role-plays. That’s valuable time you’re spending when you could be facilitating, leading, and driving change.
- Consistency matters: Without strong materials, training can feel ad-hoc. However, with a well-designed workshop pack that you plug into, you achieve consistency—so every manager leaves clear, confident, and aligned.
- Focus your energy where it counts: Use your time to customize the content—tailor the language to your culture, design breakout discussions that reflect your key themes, and rehearse your delivery. Don’t build everything from scratch.
Meet the solution: our performance appraisal skills training course materials.
The “Performance Appraisal Skills Workshop Pack” from Oak Innovation is specifically designed for this scenario.
It provides a robust foundation, complete with activities, training games, and structured content that you can deliver with confidence — and adapt quickly to your specific context.
Here’s how it helps:
- It includes numerous icebreaker options and training games (e.g., “17 proven icebreakers, 17 bonus training games”) built in from the start.
- It addresses the common pain of appraisal time being stressful, complex, and inconsistent. This pack helps cut through that.
- Because it’s ready-to-go, you spend your energy on facilitation, customisation, and connection — not building every slide from scratch.
If you’d like to check it out — see what’s included, how it’s structured — you can find it here.
How to use it powerfully
- Step 1 – Download & review: Flip through the materials. Understand the flow, pacing, and key modules.
- Step 2 – Tailor the language: Replace your organisation’s performance criteria, values, and any specific examples that your managers will relate to.
- Step 3 – Prepare your facilitation moments: Decide where you’ll amplify, ask discussion questions, and link to real-life scenarios from your team.
- Step 4 – Deliver with confidence: Because you’re working from a proven framework, you can focus on engaging your audience, making the moment matter—not worrying if you missed a slide.
- Step 5 – Refine after delivery: Gather feedback, note where participants requested more clarity, and refine your version for next time.
The benefit you unlock
When you stop building everything from scratch, you reclaim valuable hours. You get to lead with clarity. You bring a training experience that feels professional and aligned. And you keep control—because you’ll still personalise and make it yours.
Additionally, your managers leave the session feeling empowered. They’re clearer about how to conduct appraisals.
They feel less stress. They understand the process.
This leads to better conversations, increased trust, and a more improved performance culture.
(As research supports: training helps drive fairness, growth-oriented feedback, and alignment with organisational goals.)
Final word
Don’t buy into the narrative that you must build from scratch.
You could, but why would you — when that cost in time, energy, and opportunity is so high?
Instead, choose impact over perfection.
Choose speed without sacrificing quality.
Choose to step into your facilitator role as a confident designer–lead, not as a delivery person still scrambling to finish slide 39 on training day.
Grab the workshop pack. Make it yours. Lead the performance appraisal transformation that your teams deserve.
Check out the details and get started here:
I’ve got you!
Catherine Fitzgerald is the founder of Oak Innovation. With over 30 years of experience in the training and development industry, Catherine and her team are ideally positioned to help corporate trainers, people managers, and consultants access editable training course material.
