Top 10 Manager Performance Review Examples for 2026

Writing a performance review for a manager requires a different approach than evaluating an individual contributor. The focus shifts from individual output to leadership, team development, and strategic execution. A good review provides the specific, fair, and actionable feedback managers need to grow. This guide offers a collection of manager performance review examples for various roles and performance levels, helping you deliver evaluations that drive real improvement.

You will learn how to write reviews that are both supportive and direct, using proven frameworks to structure your comments. To effectively write reviews that improve manager performance, you need to understand the core competencies and areas for development. Explore these 8 essential leadership skills for managers to ground your feedback in established leadership principles. This resource helps you identify key areas where your managers excel or need support.

The goal is to remove the guesswork from the review process. Instead of struggling to find the right words, you will have access to ready-to-use templates and phrases you can adapt. We provide examples for different situations, from recognizing high achievement to addressing areas needing improvement. You will also learn how to apply frameworks like SBI (Situation, Behavior, Impact) and set SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-bound) goals. This preparation ensures your conversations are productive, reduces stress, and builds a consistent performance management culture across your organization. This guide gives you the tools to conduct these important discussions with confidence and clarity.

1. Technical Manager Performance Review - Engineering Leadership

Evaluating an engineering manager requires a specialized approach. These leaders must balance deep technical expertise with effective people management, a dual role that standard reviews often miss. A technical manager performance review specifically assesses their hands-on architectural decisions and their ability to develop a high-performing engineering team. This method is essential for managers promoted from individual contributor roles, ensuring their technical acumen translates into strong team leadership.

Companies like Google and GitHub show the value of this focused evaluation. Their reviews separate technical decision-making from team development, creating a clear picture of a manager's total impact. For example, GitHub uses dual-track performance systems to assess technical leaders and people managers on distinct but complementary criteria.

Why This Approach Is Effective

This review type directly addresses the core tension in engineering leadership: staying technically credible while fostering team growth. It helps organizations identify where a manager excels and where they need support. Does their code review feedback improve junior engineers' skills, or do they simply rewrite code themselves? A good review process uncovers these critical distinctions.

How to Implement This Review

To get the most from these manager performance review examples, you must structure the feedback to cover both domains.

• Separate Technical and Management Impact: Use specific prompts to evaluate technical contributions and leadership actions independently. Ask how the manager’s architectural choices improved system scalability. Separately, ask how their mentorship prepared a team member for a promotion.
• Apply SMART Goals to Technical Work: Frame technical initiatives with clear, measurable outcomes. Instead of a vague goal like "reduce tech debt," set a SMART goal: "Decrease critical code smells in the main repository by 15% by the end of Q3."
• Use the SBI Model for Mentorship Feedback: When giving feedback on technical mentoring, use the Situation-Behavior-Impact model. For example: "In the (Situation) Q2 project planning, your (Behavior) detailed explanation of the new API framework helped the junior developers (Impact) contribute to the project two weeks ahead of schedule."

By documenting how technical decisions influence team growth and using a structured approach, you provide clear, actionable feedback. You can find a helpful manager performance review template to customize for your engineering leaders.

2. Sales Manager Performance Review - Revenue & Team Development

Evaluating a sales manager requires a balanced perspective. These leaders must drive revenue targets and build a motivated, skilled sales team. A performance review focused on revenue and team development recognizes that great sales managers are multipliers. They elevate their entire team's performance, not their personal sales record. This method is critical for ensuring long-term, sustainable growth.

Companies like HubSpot and Salesforce champion this dual-focus evaluation. HubSpot's reviews prioritize rep development alongside quota attainment, while Salesforce uses balanced scorecards to assess managers. This approach prevents promoting a top salesperson into a management role where they fail to develop others.

Why This Approach Is Effective

This review type directly links coaching activities to sales outcomes. It helps organizations understand if a manager is creating a high-performing team or simply inheriting one. Does the manager’s deal coaching improve close rates, or do they take over calls? A proper review process distinguishes between a team’s success and a manager’s direct contribution to it.

How to Implement This Review

To get the most from these manager performance review examples, you must connect coaching actions to business results.

• Separate Revenue from Rep Development: Use specific prompts to evaluate sales targets and coaching effectiveness independently. Ask how the manager’s pipeline strategy contributed to a 10% quarter-over-quarter growth. Separately, ask how their coaching improved a new hire's ramp time.
• Apply SMART Goals to Team Growth: Frame development initiatives with clear, measurable outcomes. Instead of a goal like "improve team skills," set a SMART goal: "Increase the average deal size for all junior account executives by 12% in Q4 by implementing weekly objection-handling workshops."
• Use the SBI Model for Coaching Feedback: When giving feedback on coaching conversations, use the Situation-Behavior-Impact model. For example: "In the (Situation) monthly pipeline review, your (Behavior) guidance on qualifying enterprise leads helped the rep (Impact) build a stronger pipeline that resulted in two new closed deals this quarter."

By documenting revenue achievements and coaching impact, you create a complete picture of a sales manager's value. You can learn more about how to structure these conversations by reading about how to conduct a performance review for your team.

3. People Operations Manager Performance Review - HR & Culture Leadership

Evaluating a People Operations manager demands a focus on operational efficiency and strategic cultural impact. These leaders are responsible for the systems that keep a company running smoothly, from compliance to payroll, and the initiatives that build a thriving workplace culture. A People Operations manager performance review must assess their ability to manage HR processes effectively while driving employee engagement and retention. This method is vital for ensuring the HR function is a strategic partner to the business, not an administrative one.

Companies like Slack and Workday exemplify this dual focus. Slack's People Operations team, for instance, measures its success through direct impacts on employee engagement and retention. Workday encourages a shift away from purely transactional HR measures toward strategic metrics that demonstrate the HR team's contribution to broader business goals.

Why This Approach Is Effective

This review type connects day-to-day HR tasks to the company’s long-term health. It helps organizations understand if their People Ops leader is managing processes or actively shaping a positive and productive environment. When reviewing a People Operations Manager, evaluating their leadership in fostering a positive culture often includes their ability to implement effective practical retention strategies. A strong review process clarifies this link.

How to Implement This Review

To get the most from these manager performance review examples, you must build the evaluation to cover both operational and strategic responsibilities.

• Establish Baseline Metrics: Before the review period, set clear metrics for key areas like employee retention, engagement survey scores, and time-to-hire. This provides a quantitative foundation for evaluating the manager’s strategic impact.
• Apply SMART Goals to All Initiatives: Frame operational and cultural goals with specific outcomes. Instead of "improve onboarding," a SMART goal would be: "Increase the 90-day retention rate for new hires by 10% in the next six months by redesigning the onboarding checklist and mentorship program."
• Use the SBI Model for Collaboration Feedback: When assessing how a People Ops manager works with other departments, use the Situation-Behavior-Impact model. For example: "During the (Situation) Q3 benefits renewal, your (Behavior) pro-active communication with the finance team (Impact) resulted in a 5% cost saving without reducing employee coverage."

By documenting how HR processes influence business outcomes, you provide clear, actionable feedback. You can explore different development objectives for managers to help guide their growth in both operational and strategic areas.

4. Product Manager Performance Review - Strategy & Execution

Evaluating a product manager requires a balanced look at their strategic vision and execution capabilities. These leaders must translate high-level company goals into concrete product roadmaps while rallying cross-functional teams to deliver results. A product manager performance review assesses their ability to define a clear product strategy, understand customer needs, and lead through influence to ship impactful features. This approach is critical for ensuring PMs are not just managing backlogs but are driving true business outcomes.

Companies like Amazon and Figma champion this dual-focus evaluation. Amazon's reviews famously connect a PM's work to principles like "Customer Obsession" and "Bias for Action," measuring both strategic customer insight and the drive to execute. Figma evaluates its PMs on the strategic impact of their work, not on the volume of features shipped.

Why This Approach Is Effective

This review type holds product managers accountable for both the "what" and the "how." It prevents a PM from succeeding by shipping many features that fail to move key metrics or by creating a great strategy that never gets built. It clarifies whether a PM's product decisions are grounded in solid customer discovery and are aligned with business objectives. A good review reveals if they are influencing their engineering and design partners effectively.

How to Implement This Review

To get the most from these manager performance review examples, you must structure the feedback to connect strategy directly to execution.

• Separate Strategy from Execution: Use specific questions to evaluate product vision and delivery actions. For example, ask how the manager’s customer research informed the Q3 roadmap. Separately, ask how they navigated engineering constraints to launch a key feature on time.
• Apply SMART Goals to Product Initiatives: Frame both discovery and delivery work with measurable outcomes. Instead of a goal like "improve user engagement," set a SMART goal: "Increase the weekly active user to daily active user ratio by 10% within 60 days of the new dashboard launch."
• Use the SBI Model for Cross-Functional Feedback: When assessing leadership, use the Situation-Behavior-Impact model. For example: "During the (Situation) Q1 roadmap conflict, your (Behavior) facilitation of a trade-off discussion with marketing and engineering led to (Impact) a revised plan that all teams supported, preventing a major delay."

By documenting how strategic choices lead to tangible outcomes, you provide a clear and fair assessment. A well-structured manager performance review template can help you formalize this process and ensure consistency for all your product leaders.

5. Customer Success Manager Performance Review - Retention & Expansion

Evaluating a customer success manager (CSM) requires a framework that balances customer health with business growth. These managers are responsible for ensuring customers achieve their desired outcomes and identifying opportunities for revenue expansion. A specialized performance review for CSMs assesses their ability to drive customer satisfaction and retention while contributing to net revenue retention (NRR). This approach is critical for SaaS and subscription-based businesses where long-term customer value is paramount.

Companies like Zendesk and Gainsight champion this dual-focus evaluation. Zendesk uses customer health scores, a combination of product usage data and satisfaction metrics, as a primary CSM performance indicator. Gainsight's platform encourages proactive customer success activities that directly link to expansion revenue, treating retention and growth as two sides of the same coin.

Why This Approach Is Effective

This review type formalizes the CSM's dual role as a customer advocate and a revenue driver. It provides a clear, data-backed method for measuring their impact on customer loyalty and the company's bottom line. The review helps distinguish between CSMs who are great at maintaining relationships and those who actively turn successful customers into growth opportunities. This clarity is essential for aligning the CS team with broader business objectives.

How to Implement This Review

To get the most from these manager performance review examples, you must create a balanced scorecard that tracks both service and sales-oriented metrics.

• Separate Retention and Expansion Metrics: Use distinct goals for customer retention and revenue expansion. For example, set a goal to maintain a 95% gross retention rate. Separately, set a goal to generate a 20% expansion MRR from the existing customer base.
• Apply SMART Goals to Customer Outcomes: Define success with specific, measurable goals tied to customer value. Instead of "improve customer health," a SMART goal would be: "Increase the product adoption rate for key feature X by 25% across your top 10 accounts by the end of the quarter."
• Use the SBI Model for Client Communication: When providing feedback on customer interactions, use the Situation-Behavior-Impact model. For instance: "In the (Situation) Q3 business review with Acme Corp, your (Behavior) proactive presentation of the new analytics module led to a (Impact) 15% contract expansion and a stronger strategic partnership."

6. Content & Marketing Manager Performance Review - Output & Outcomes

Evaluating a marketing manager means looking beyond creative ideas to measure their real-world impact. These leaders must balance high-quality content output with tangible business outcomes like lead generation and brand growth. A review focused on output and outcomes assesses their ability to connect creative strategy to the company's bottom line. This approach is critical for ensuring marketing efforts contribute directly to revenue and strategic goals.

Companies like HubSpot show this method's value by evaluating their marketing leaders on content quality and its effect on lead metrics. Similarly, platforms like Drift emphasize real-time engagement alongside content production, linking marketing activities directly to sales pipeline growth. This dual focus creates a complete picture of a manager's performance.

Why This Approach Is Effective

This review type directly connects a marketing manager's daily work to business success. It helps organizations understand if the team is busy or if their work is effective. Are blog posts simply being published, or are they attracting qualified leads? A well-structured review answers these vital questions by linking activity to results.

How to Implement This Review

To get the most from these manager performance review examples, you must structure feedback to evaluate both content production and business impact.

• Track Both Leading and Lagging Indicators: Assess leading indicators like web traffic and social engagement, which show immediate traction. Also, measure lagging indicators such as qualified leads and revenue attribution to evaluate long-term success.
• Apply SMART Goals to Campaigns: Frame marketing initiatives with specific, measurable outcomes. Instead of a goal like "increase brand awareness," set a SMART goal: "Grow organic search traffic to key product pages by 20% in Q4 by publishing four targeted blog posts per month."
• Use the SBI Model for Campaign Feedback: When reviewing campaign decisions, use the Situation-Behavior-Impact model. For example: "During the (Situation) Q3 product launch, your (Behavior) decision to focus on video testimonials resulted in a (Impact) 40% higher conversion rate on the landing page compared to our previous text-only campaigns."

By documenting how creative choices influence business metrics and using a structured approach, you provide clear, actionable feedback. This helps marketing managers refine their strategies to deliver measurable value.

7. Operations Manager Performance Review - Efficiency & Scalability

Evaluating an operations manager requires a focus on measurable impact. These leaders are responsible for the systems and processes that allow a business to run smoothly and scale effectively. An operations manager performance review must assess their ability to drive efficiency, automate tasks, and build frameworks that support growth. This approach is critical for ensuring the company’s internal machinery keeps pace with its strategic ambitions.

Companies known for rapid growth, like Meta and Square, place a strong emphasis on operational excellence. Their reviews evaluate operations leaders on key metrics such as cost per user, process efficiency gains, and the successful automation of manual workflows. Sequoia Capital also encourages its portfolio companies to prioritize operational leadership, viewing it as a direct lever for sustainable growth.

Why This Approach Is Effective

This review type connects an operations manager's daily work directly to the company's bottom line and long-term health. It moves the evaluation beyond simple task completion to a strategic assessment of their contribution to scalability. Does a new process solve today's problem, or does it prepare the company for 10x growth? These reviews help answer that question and identify managers who are true business partners.

How to Implement This Review

To get the most from these manager performance review examples, you must ground the feedback in quantifiable data and strategic outcomes.

• Quantify Impact with Metrics: Connect every goal and piece of feedback to a specific number. Instead of "improved a process," use "reduced the time for new client onboarding by 48 hours, saving 10 team hours per week." Focus on hours saved, costs reduced, or quality improved.
• Apply SMART Goals to Automation: Frame efficiency initiatives with clear targets. A goal like "improve team efficiency" becomes a SMART goal: "Automate the weekly reporting process by the end of Q2, eliminating four hours of manual data entry for the team each week."
• Use the SBI Model for Cross-Functional Work: When giving feedback on projects involving multiple departments, use the Situation-Behavior-Impact model. For example: "During the (Situation) Q3 system migration, your (Behavior) proactive communication with the finance and sales teams (Impact) prevented data discrepancies and ensured a smooth transition with zero downtime."

By documenting how process improvements drive business scalability, you provide clear, compelling evidence of an operations manager's value. This structured method ensures your feedback is fair and directly tied to company objectives.

8. Engineering Manager Performance Review - Team Productivity & Innovation

Evaluating an engineering manager goes beyond their individual technical skills. It must assess their ability to cultivate a productive and innovative team. This review type focuses on outcomes like delivery consistency, technical strategy, and innovation, while ensuring code quality and team well-being are not sacrificed. It measures a manager’s success by their team's collective output and sustainable pace, not their personal contributions.

Leading companies like Netflix and Stripe exemplify this balanced approach. Netflix evaluates its engineering managers on team velocity and technical quality equally, linking manager performance directly to team health. Stripe’s managers are responsible for tracking and reducing technical debt alongside delivering new features, ensuring long-term system health.

Why This Approach Is Effective

This review method ensures managers prioritize sustainable productivity over short-term gains. It pushes them to build systems and processes that enable their team to innovate and deliver consistently without burning out. This focus helps organizations distinguish between managers who drive results by empowering their team and those who achieve them at the team's expense. This is a critical insight for building a strong engineering culture.

How to Implement This Review

To get the most from these manager performance review examples, you must create a feedback structure that connects team output to leadership behaviors.

• Separate Capacity from Execution: When evaluating missed targets, first analyze if the team had the capacity to succeed. Distinguish between planning issues (under-resourcing) and execution issues (process failures or skill gaps).
• Apply SMART Goals to Delivery and Development: Set measurable goals for both product delivery and team improvement. For example: "Increase deployment frequency by 20% in Q4 while maintaining a code-coverage score above 85%."
• Use the SBI Model for Technical Leadership Feedback: Frame feedback on how the manager guides the team. For instance: "In the (Situation) Q3 roadmap planning, your (Behavior) decision to allocate a sprint for refactoring our core service (Impact) unblocked two major feature initiatives and reduced bug reports by 30%."

By documenting how a manager's strategic decisions affect team productivity and innovation, you provide clear, actionable feedback. This helps you build a strong foundation for your evaluations and guides managers toward creating high-performing, resilient teams.

9. Department Manager Performance Review - Cross-Functional Leadership

Evaluating a department manager requires a framework that measures their ability to lead a specific function while aligning with broader organizational goals. These leaders must balance deep functional expertise with strategic, cross-functional collaboration. A department manager performance review assesses their team's performance, their strategic contributions, and their ability to work effectively with other departments to drive collective success. This method is critical for ensuring functional silos do not hinder overall business progress.

Consulting firms and large corporations show the value of this approach. McKinsey evaluates its practice leaders using function-agnostic frameworks that prioritize impact across the firm. Accenture assesses its functional leaders on delivery excellence, people development, and innovation, ensuring their work supports the entire organization.

Why This Approach Is Effective

This review type directly links a department's activities to the company's strategic objectives. It helps organizations measure how a functional leader contributes to projects and initiatives beyond their immediate team. Does the marketing department's new campaign directly support sales targets? Is the IT department's infrastructure upgrade enabling better product development? This process clarifies the manager's organizational impact.

How to Implement This Review

To get the most from these manager performance review examples, you must structure the feedback to cover functional and cross-functional responsibilities.

• Separate Departmental and Organizational Impact: Use specific prompts to evaluate the manager's success within their department and their contributions to the wider organization. For instance, ask how the manager improved their team’s efficiency. Separately, ask how their collaboration with another department led to a successful product launch.
• Apply SMART Goals to Both Domains: Frame departmental initiatives and collaborative projects with measurable outcomes. Instead of a goal like "improve inter-departmental communication," set a SMART goal: "Implement a shared project dashboard with the Product team by Q2, resulting in a 20% reduction in status update meetings."
• Use the SBI Model for Collaboration Feedback: When giving feedback on cross-functional work, use the Situation-Behavior-Impact model. For example: "In the (Situation) Q4 budget planning meeting, your (Behavior) proactive sharing of your team's resource constraints helped the finance team (Impact) reallocate funds more effectively, preventing project delays."

By documenting both hard metrics and qualitative feedback on collaboration, you provide a complete and actionable performance summary. A solid manager performance review template can be adapted to fit the unique goals of any department head.

10. Remote & Distributed Team Manager Performance Review - Engagement & Connection

Evaluating managers of remote or distributed teams requires a specialized framework. These leaders face unique challenges in building culture, maintaining engagement, and ensuring inclusion without the benefit of physical proximity. A remote manager performance review specifically assesses their ability to foster connection and productivity through asynchronous communication and deliberate trust-building actions. This method is critical for ensuring remote work's success depends on strong leadership, not technology.

Companies like GitLab and Zapier excel with this focused evaluation. GitLab, an all-remote company, evaluates managers on their asynchronous communication skills. Zapier's reviews emphasize trust and autonomy, which are essential for remote team effectiveness. These organizations recognize that successful remote management hinges on intentional, documented communication rather than informal office interactions.

Why This Approach Is Effective

This review type directly addresses the core responsibilities of remote leadership: creating psychological safety and clear communication channels across distances. It helps organizations identify managers who build cohesive teams versus those who let team members become isolated. Are their virtual meetings inclusive of all time zones, or do they default to what is convenient for headquarters? A well-structured remote review uncovers these vital distinctions.

How to Implement This Review

To get the most from these manager performance review examples, you must structure feedback to cover both engagement and operational effectiveness.

• Focus on Asynchronous and Synchronous Touchpoints: Use specific prompts to evaluate the quality of both real-time meetings and written documentation. Ask how the manager uses the company handbook to answer questions. Separately, ask how they facilitate inclusive discussions during video calls.
• Apply SMART Goals to Engagement Initiatives: Frame connection-building activities with clear, measurable outcomes. Instead of a vague goal like "improve team morale," set a SMART goal: "Increase the team's eNPS score by 10 points by the end of Q4 by implementing weekly kudos in the team channel and one new virtual social event per month."
• Use the SBI Model for Communication Feedback: When giving feedback on communication, use the Situation-Behavior-Impact model. For example: "In the (Situation) project update thread last week, your (Behavior) detailed summary with clear action items (Impact) prevented confusion and allowed the team in the APAC region to proceed without waiting for the next sync meeting."

By documenting how a manager builds connection and clarity, you provide actionable feedback tailored to the remote environment. You can find a dedicated manager performance review template to customize for your distributed leaders, ensuring your evaluations are relevant and fair.

10-Role Manager Performance Review Comparison

Turn Your Manager Reviews into a Growth Tool

The detailed manager performance review examples throughout this article demonstrate a core principle. Effective feedback is specific, evidence-based, and forward-looking. Your objective is not to deliver a verdict on past actions. Instead, your goal is to provide clarity that inspires future growth and improves performance.

By focusing on observable situations, behaviors, and their resulting impact, you build a solid foundation for a productive conversation. This method, often structured using frameworks like SBI (Situation-Behavior-Impact), helps your managers understand precisely what actions to continue and which areas require focused development. It removes ambiguity and defensiveness from the review process.

From Examples to Actionable Feedback

Moving from a template to a personalized review requires thoughtful preparation. The provided examples serve as a starting point. Your next step is to adapt them with concrete data and specific instances relevant to each manager's unique context and responsibilities.

• Gather Specific Data: Collect metrics, project outcomes, and 360-degree feedback.
• Identify Key Behaviors: Connect the data to the manager's actions and decisions.
• Define Clear Impact: Explain how these behaviors affected the team, the department, and the company's goals.

This preparation turns a generic phrase into a piece of feedback. For example, "Needs to improve communication" becomes "In the Q3 planning meeting, the project timeline was not clearly communicated, which caused two engineers to duplicate work and miss the initial deadline." This level of detail drives real behavioral change.

The Strategic Value of Consistent Manager Feedback

Mastering the manager performance review is a high-leverage activity. When you provide high-quality, consistent feedback to your leaders, you create a ripple effect throughout the organization. Well-coached managers become better coaches themselves, improving engagement, retention, and productivity across their teams.

This process is a primary driver of leadership development. It builds a culture where feedback is viewed not as criticism, but as a commitment to professional growth. You are investing in your leaders, which is one of the most effective ways to scale your organization's talent and capabilities. These conversations, when handled correctly, reinforce company values and align leadership behavior with strategic objectives.

Remember, the goal is progress, not perfection. Each review is an opportunity to strengthen your relationship with your managers, clarify expectations, and collaboratively build a plan for their continued success. The examples and frameworks provided here are your tools to make every manager review a catalyst for meaningful, sustained improvement.

Ready to build fair, effective reviews without starting from scratch? PeakPerf provides guided workflows and leadership frameworks to help you draft structured, professional feedback in minutes. It turns the principles from these manager performance review examples into a simple, repeatable process for your organization. Find out more at PeakPerf.