Updated September 2026: in January 2020 I wrote a nervous note while waiting for my appraisal letter, and never followed it up here. I have rewritten it into what I wish I had done in the months before that letter.
In early January 2020 I was a day or two away from my annual hike and promotion letter, refreshing my inbox and wondering whether another year of work would be recognised. What bothered me most was that I had more years of experience than some people graded above me, and I had never raised it properly.
Waiting anxiously for a letter is the least useful part of appraisal season. By the time it arrives, the decision was made weeks earlier. The useful work happens before that.
When is your hike actually decided?
In most large Indian IT companies, ratings are calibrated by managers and their managers in a session you are not part of, usually weeks before letters go out. Budgets for hikes and promotions are set at company level first and then divided down. Your manager walks into that session with whatever they remember about your year, which is why the preparation has to happen well before it.
What should you prepare before the review?
- A one-page summary of your year: the work you delivered, with numbers where you have them, and the escalations you resolved.
- Evidence of scope above your grade: if you led work that someone at the next grade would normally lead, say so with examples.
- Feedback you received: client or onsite appreciation emails, saved in one folder through the year.
- Your ask: promotion, a specific kind of work, or a correction to your grade. Decide it in advance.
Hand the summary to your manager before calibration, not after the letter. Managers are grateful for it, because it makes their own case easier to argue.
How do you raise a grade that lags your experience?
Calmly and with facts. "I have eleven years of experience and I am graded below colleagues with seven" is a reasonable thing to say, but it lands better with evidence that your work is already at the higher level. Ask your manager what specifically stands between you and the next grade, and ask for it in writing. A vague "next cycle" answer repeated twice is information in itself.
What if the letter disappoints?
Do not reply the same day. Read it, sleep on it, then ask for a meeting to understand the rating. Go in asking what the gap was, not arguing that the decision was wrong. Most companies have a formal route to contest a rating, but it rarely changes the outcome in the current cycle. What it does is put your concern on record for the next one.
And be honest with yourself. If the market pays your experience noticeably more than your company does, a switch will usually move your salary further than any appraisal. Many people in Indian IT have found that the fastest raise comes from a new offer, not an old employer.
What I would tell myself in January 2020
Stop refreshing the inbox. The letter was already written. The time to influence it had been months earlier, with a one-page summary and a direct question about my grade, rather than two days of worrying about a decision that rested on someone else's memory.
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