The Gorko Gazette

Swanson Ford – Employee Self-Appraisal

To be completed and delivered to Tommy Swanson by Friday, October 31, 2025.

Job Definition

1.      Given your role, which professional responsibilities do you view as most important?  Why?

• As Office Manager, I am responsible for coordinating the master schedule for shifts worked by our 16 salesmen (including one woman), our 4 Service Advisors, our 13 Service Technicians, and various others.  If I wasn’t coordinating this, we might not have sufficient coverage for the number of customers we are expecting on any given day.  
• I am responsible for processing the bi-weekly payroll of Swanson Ford’s 37 employees.  
• I feel as if I’m responsible for employee morale here at Swanson Ford.  Back in February, I came back from being out sick for three days and found that almost everyone was super-cranky.  The complaints I heard when I first returned were almost all gone within three days of my return.  

2.      Have there been any special circumstances that have helped or hindered you in handling your responsibilities this year?   If yes, what were the circumstances and how did they affect your work?

• The efficiency of my work has been helped tremendously by the implementation this past April of the new DealerData Management System (DDMS) to track work shifts, repair appointments, and parts inventory.  Moving away from documenting all of our work by pencil and paper, and eliminating all the time spent filing those papers, I am now getting more done with fewer mistakes.  I can’t believe it took so long for Swanson Ford to join the 21st century … I’ve been begging for us to upgrade our processes since getting hired back in 2014!
• My ability to complete my work in a timely manner has been hindered by the amount of time I spend communicating with Branden Desrochers, Tier II Technician.  I am spending far too much time listening to Branden complain about how his former girlfriend should take him back and how he understands that he is the one who “messed up” their relationship.  He keeps asking for my advice on how he might convince her to move back from Boise, as if I could help him!  Even when I ignore Branden and focus on my work, he keeps yapping at me.  I’ve been trying to assign time-consuming work for him, so that he doesn’t visit me as often, but he keeps finding a way to stop by my desk on his way to the restroom or coming back from the vending machine.  

Accomplishments

1.      List your most significant accomplishments or contributions during the past year. 

• Learning to effectively use the DealerData Management System despite the ineptitude of their Training Consultant, Timothy McWade.  That guy did not know what he was talking about.  Almost everything I learned was thanks to my reading the DDMS User Manual and watching YouTube videos.
• Keeping Tyler Swinton and Kevin Kwan from punching each other. Tyler was up in Kevin’s face as recently as this morning.  Ever since Tyler found out Kevin would get the commission for selling that Bronco Raptor back in July, the two of them have been sniping at each other.   (Tyler was the first to meet the couple, for maybe thirty minutes, but Keven spent about five hours with them over three different days, including two different test drives, while Tyler was out with COVID.)  Both of those guys believe they are the best car salesmen to ever have lived, and both are wrong.  

2.      In the past year, have you performed any new tasks or additional duties inside or outside the scope of your regular responsibilities?   If so, please specify.

• I feel like it’s become my job to ask Geoffrey Vasielmo to stop smoking inside the garage whenever it’s cold outside.  I caught him puffing away on his Marlboro Reds, over in the corner near the tire repair station, almost every day during the winter months … sometimes twice in a day!  Does he really not understand that all the gas fumes inside our building (not to mention the oil stains on the floor) constitute a fire hazard?  Are our other Service Technicians not aware of the risk he’s been creating?  If so, why haven’t they said anything to Geoffrey?  Why am I always the one asking him to step outside?  (Every time I do, Geoffrey acts like he doesn’t understand why I’ve asked him to skedaddle.)

3.      What would you have liked to have done in the past year but were unable to do?  Why?

• No matter how hard I’ve tried, it seems I am unable to properly train my backup for shift scheduling and payroll processing, Helene Swanson.  Whenever I am away from the office, for vacation or sick time, Helene is almost always available to step in to sit at my desk and to cover my duties.  I do appreciate her flexibility and know that she is a kindhearted person who cares deeply about the success of Swanson Ford.  But, whenever she has needed to create the shift schedule for the upcoming month, I’ve come back to find Service Technicians were over-booked on one day and under-booked on the next.  The two times she was asked to process payroll checks, she could not.  The checks only went out after I returned.  She has been sweet about it, but she’s refusing to learn anything about the new DDMS.  I hope I don’t get into trouble by saying this to you, Tommy, but even if she is your wife (and regularly brings in baked goods for the break room), I don’t think she should be my backup.  

Goal Setting                                                                                             

1.    What are your professional goals for the coming year and what actions will you take to accomplish these goals?

• Help Swanson Ford become the top-selling Ford dealership in the state of Washington.  I will help accomplish this goal by being the best Office Manager I can be.  
• Help the rest of the staff become fully comfortable using the DDMS.  I will accomplish this by offering monthly DDMS Learning Sessions, over lunches that I’m planning to have catered by Miggy’s Deli.  
• Get all the men working at Swanson Ford (yes, ALL the men) to stop talking about and ogling Veronica (‘Roni’) Sinicki, our one female salesperson.  Yes, Roni is an attractive woman, but this is 2025 and the men around here seem not to have learned the lessons they should have from the “Me Too” movement.  I’d really like for the men to stop coming up with suggestive nicknames for her, to stop standing right behind her when she’s at her desk, and to stop gawking as she is walking away from them.  I had to deal with that sort of behavior 25 years ago, over at Bristol Chevrolet, but Roni should not. Besides, Roni is going through a divorce (Did you know that Tommy?) and has not been feeling confident enough to confront those who are offering unwanted attention.  My plan to accomplish this goal is to call the men out when they act inappropriately, especially those of you who are married.  I will speak with the men as soon as I can after I witness one of these behaviors.  I might even announce it over the intercom if there are no customers in the building.  (Yes, Tommy, I will even call you out if you keep staring at her.)  

2.    What else would help you to do your job better and to provide greater job satisfaction?

• Send me to attend the annual meeting for all DDMS-users across the country.  It’s being held in Kansas City this coming fall.  

• Fire and replace Branden Desrochers.
• Force the two of them to attend therapy together, or fire and replace Tyler Swinton OR Kevin Kwan.  I don’t care which of them goes.  
• Either put a smoke detector and CCTV over near the tire repair station, or fire and replace Geoffrey Vasielmo.  
• Find someone else to be my backup other than Helene.  Knowing about your plans to have your daughter Georgia take over the business when you retire next year, I honestly believe it will be beneficial for her to learn about my day-to-day work.  She will better understand the ins and outs of the business if she spends some time in my role. 
• Allow me to assign $1 fines to any male employee who acts inappropriately towards Veronica.  If I can take some of their hard-earned money and add it to what I will be calling “Roni’s Jar,” I bet you men will begin to at least act as if you are not a bunch of insufferable leches.  Although I know not everyone will agree to give me $1 per misbehavior, I expect I will receive enough money to buy Roni, Helene, and me a nice dinner at the end of next year.  
• An increase in my pay would certainly be appreciated! 

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