[thackerhacker]

When I went from contractor to permanent at my last employer the goal-setting really stressed me out as I knew I didn’t want to be held responsible for something that might change.

In the end I just decided to stop thinking about it to avoid the stress and my manager stopped asking. End of the year I filled in suitable goals based on what I had done and explained how well I’d met them.

It worked very well for me and I did the same for every year I was employed there.

[datavirtue]

Same here. This was at GE, the goal and review structure is elaborate, shifting, and based on a slew of cultural and corporate factors and cult bullshit. A real mess. You better have a cool manager that knows how to deal with it in an optimal way or it is a very very painful waste of time. My manager was brand new and by the book...greatly hastening my exit.

On top of all that it actually did influence your ability to progress (I just told them I had no aspirations of advancement beyond my current position...again, further hastening my exit lol).