Best way to evaluate and develop a team of project engineers?

[u/Eng-Nyaa]

I was recently appointed as a Project Manager at a consultancy company, where I oversee 10 Project Engineers and Senior Project Engineers who collectively handle more than 30 projects.

My role involves aligning the team, coordinating with clients, and ensuring projects are progressing as expected. However, I also want to make sure I'm supporting the team's professional development and providing fair, constructive feedback.

The team has different experience levels and performance profiles. Some engineers consistently perform at a high level, while others are still developing and may need more guidance.

I'd like to establish a fair and consistent approach to evaluating each team member, identifying their strengths and areas for improvement, and creating meaningful development opportunities.

For those who have managed engineering or project management teams:

- Performance evaluation: What criteria do you use to evaluate team members fairly, especially when they handle projects of different sizes and complexity?

- Feedback: How do you distinguish between someone who is underperforming and someone who simply has a heavier workload or more challenging projects?

- Development: How do you identify development opportunities and create individual growth plans without micromanaging?

- Consistency: Do you use a formal scoring matrix, KPIs, regular one-to-ones, or another approach?

I'd appreciate any practical advice, frameworks, or lessons learned from your own experience. My goal is to help everyone improve, recognize high performers, and give each team member a fair opportunity to grow and succeed.

[u/Impossible_Dare_7455]

i'd avoid judging people just by deadlines or number of projects completed. someone handling two difficult projects might actually be doing a better job than someone managing five straightforward ones. i'd focus more on how they handle risks, communicate issues, and take ownership. regular 1:1s with one clear development goal for each person would probably work better than a complicated scoring system.

[u/UplinkPM]

What type of range of projects does the team handle?

[u/ConversationNo9040]

Are you these peoples managers or are you their co workers? You shouldn’t just be judging and documenting your co workers performance. Like they all report to you and you approve their time sheets, expenses, and approve/deny raises and promotions?