The Accomplishments


The purpose of the Navy Eval is to accurately and fully describe a Sailor's performance during the reporting period. While the Introduction provides information on the person's personality and character, most of the Comments on Performance block is reserved for recording the person's accomplishments during the reporting period. A list of accomplishments provide a factual window into a person's abilities, skills, and productivity. The number of lines in an eval devoted to accomplishments compared to the number of lines set aside for the introduction provides some insight into the importance the Navy places on technical skill and ability. Technical and professional qualities are critically important for advancement, fully as important as a person's social and leadership skills.

Sometimes, when the annual performance review comes due, it's hard to come up with enough accomplishments to fill the block. The things we do every day might not seem notable or important enough to record in a performance report. But they are. The things that all of us do every day are indispensable to the continued success of the Navy. The way to overcome this natural writer's block is to brainstorm first. List all the ratee's accomplishments on a separate sheet of paper. Write down everything that the ratee did (within the reporting period) that might qualify as an accomplishment. Nothing is too small or mundane. Make sure off-duty education, duty qualification, community involvement, and training is addressed too. Use the ratee's duty description to get started but be sure to ask the ratee for input too.

One thing that's important to realize is that when you're putting together a list of achievements, don't hold back! If you're new to Navy Evaluations, you might be reluctant to claim credit for any achievements that you weren't one hundred percent responsible for. Don't be! Most workcenter accomplishments require the efforts of many people and are the product of teamwork. If you had any part in an accomplishment, you are allowed to claim it and list it as your own. A supervisor will often reuse the same accomplishments, over and over, in several people's EVALs so it's not unexpected or unprecedented. If you had any part in an achievement, from documenting it in a log to turning a wrench, you can claim it. So claim everything and let your supervisor sort it out. And don't worry that your supervisor will scrutinize your inputs and dispute your claims. It doesn't happen. A supervisor is much more concerned with getting enough material for your Eval than with analyzing which person contributed the most to this or that project.



Comments on Performance Block Format

  1. Introduction: two or three lines for the rater to describe the ratee's performance and character.
  2. The introduction should describe aspects of character not readily apparent from accomplishments.
  3. ...continued Introduction or first duty-related accomplishment
  4. duty-related accomplishment
  5. duty-related accomplishment
  6. duty-related accomplishment
  7. duty-related accomplishment
  8. duty-related accomplishment
  9. accomplishment
  10. accomplishment
  11. accomplishment
  12. accomplishment
  13. accomplishment
  14. accomplishment
  15. ...continuation of last accomplishment or first line of Summary
  16. Summary: one or two lines for the rater to summarize the ratee's performance and make a promotion statement.




List Achievements in Logical and Descending Order

After you've brainstormed and came up with a list of accomplishments, sort them into four categories:


  • duty-related, primary or collateral duties
  • leadership/mentoring/climate
  • qualification, training, self-improvement
  • community service


The reason for sorting the accomplishments into groups is because they are required to be listed in the Eval in a certain order. The list above is ordered by the level of importance. When listing achievements in the Comments on Performance block, the duty-related accomplishments should be listed at the top, on the first line of achievements, right below the Introduction. After listing all the duty-related statements, then list the other categories in the order shown above. Add your leadership-related accomplishments, then training and self-improvement statements, and finally community service entries. Keep categories together for ease of reading. Keep in mind that the Navy wants well-rounded people so your Eval should reflect this. Make sure you include statements that represent all the categories shown above and whatever trait the Navy is emphasizing at the moment (diversity, education, etc).

Note: Some types of achievements must be listed in Block 44:


  • Qualifications Attained During the Reporting Period
  • Courses Completed During the Reporting Period
  • Civic Activities Beneficial To the Navy
  • Awards and Commendations


A suggested number of lines to devote to each topic is:


  • Introduction : 2 Lines
  • duty-related : 6 Lines
  • leadership / Navy's currently emphasized topic : 2 Lines
  • qualification, training, self-improvement : 2 Lines
  • community service : 2 Lines
  • Summary : 2 Lines


The duty-related bullets are considered to be the most important and that's why they're listed first. It is said that reviewers are often in a hurry and can't afford to spend a lot of time reading individual performance reports. They may only glance at the first few lines. So, knowing that we must grab the reviewer's attention in the first few lines, the best accomplishments should be listed first, at the top. The next important accomplishment would be second and so on until you reach the "contributed to the Combined Federal Campaign" bullet at the bottom.




Be as Specific as Possible

Be as specific as possible. The overall goal of the performance report is to, as accurately as possible, describe a person's performance. To that end, every statement should be qualified. Qualified means supporting the statement with facts and numbers. For example, consider the following claim:

Treated sick dogs and cats and prevented spread of communicable disease.

To make this statement more specific, the number of dogs and cats should be listed. If a high number of pets were treated as compared to the total population, consider listing the number as a percentage if that makes the statement stronger. If 95 out of 100 possible pets were treated, it would have more impact to describe the quantity as a percentage: 95% of base pets treated. Was the disease minor or fatal? What was its impact? Be specific!

Treated 95 of 100 base pets and confined spread of fatal, contagious disease to off-base community, reduced fatalities to zero.

Also, avoid using terms like "more than 100 repairs" or "over 1,000 messages". Use exact numbers.



Make it Easy to Read

If you want to go the extra mile and make your eval stand out, make it easy to read. Write the statements so that anyone can understand them. Use common language and avoid tehnical jargon unique to your rating. The Evaluation will be reviewed at boards consisting of Senior NCOs and officers from a variety of career fields so it must be understandable to a broad audience.

Make sure the accomplishments are listed in a logical order. Make each bullet statement either one or two or three lines long as appropriate. In other words, try not to end one statement in the middle of a line and start another one on the same line.


Ranked #1 of 5 in Operations department and #4 of 10 assigned. Dependable and
capable, an absolute must select for Petty Officer.
- Knowledgeable and fearless, served as Watch Officer, an E-6 duty! Led a team of
joint military personnel providing unparalleled C2 support to the deployed Warfighter
- LEADERSHIP. Set the example for peers and subordinates alike. He is the
cornerstone of our team, reduced backlog of reports by 50%, first time in years!
- 100% scrutiny of all message traffic kept center apprised of rapid changes,
ahead of fleet. Proven ability to oversee CIC in support of joint ops with allied navies
- LOYALTY. Assisted in efforts to make first-ever CPO induction onboard USS Florida
mirroring that of the USS CONSTITUTION; instilled core values in new CPO Selectees
- Attended Norfolk Employment Superbowl; processed hundreds of lead cards for potential
Navy recruits, information forwarded to appropriate Navy Recruiting Stations
- Completed 12 hrs toward Information Systems Management BS; poised for greater challenges
- Engaged in community. Assisted Elementary School, raised over $6K for new furniture
PN1 Dugan is ready for immediate promotion to Chief. He has the mental maturity and
motivation to assume more responsibility and is strongly recommended for promotion.


In general, the more bullets listed, the better. Six hard-hitting two-line bullets are better than four three-line bullets because they indicate more productivity and action. However don't sacrifice quality for quantity.

In the event that you don't have enough achievements to fill all the space on the form as shown above, expand the Introduction and Summary to three lines each which will reduce the number of lines for accomplishments to ten. The Eval will still look good.

After writing a suitable Introduction and providing an appropriate list of achievements, all that's left to do is provide closing comments.




Use this form for contributions and comments.