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The background to the dispute was set out in paragraphs 5 to 37 of the judgment under appeal, as follows: ‘1. The tasks of the applicant and the appraisal system within OHIM 5 The applicant is an official in the Administrator function group (AD), at Grade AD 10. He took up his duties with OHIM in 1998. Until November 2009, he occupied the post of legal assistant with the Second Board of Appeal of OHIM. Since then, he has been employed as an intellectual property administrator in Service 2 of the “Operations” department and is in charge of decisions on Community trade mark applications. His line manager, head of Service 2 and his reporting officer, is Ms A. The Director of the “Operations” department and the applicant’s countersigning officer is Mr B. 6 In accordance with OHIM’s practice of management by objectives, in respect of each appraisal exercise, each member of staff is assigned five objectives. Objective 1, which concerns all OHIM staff, defines the expected contribution from each member of staff to the overall objective of OHIM; objective 2 concerns all the staff in a given OHIM department; objectives 3, 4 and 5 ... are individual and concern, inter alia, the performance expected from the member of staff in terms of quantity, quality, observance of time-limits and professional development. 7 The applicant is a member of the Opposition Divisions within the meaning of Article 132 of Regulation No 207/2009. Every member of an Opposition Division must draft a certain number of decisions as Rapporteur and must re-read and co-sign the decisions of his colleagues. 8 Objective 3 for an administrator in the “Operations” department is the adoption of decisions for a total of 115 points per year. That system of points is based on a classification of decisions according to their level of difficulty. 9 Within the “Operations” department, the output of the administrators adopting decisions is reviewed each month in relation to the quantitative objectives by means of statistics and reports. … 3. The appraisal period from 1 October 2010 to 30 September 2011 11 In respect of the appraisal period from 1 October 2010 to 30 September 2011, the applicant was assigned, in terms of the adoption of decisions, an amended annual quantitative objective of 105.4 points out of the 115 points normally required, in order to take account of the fact that, for two months of the appraisal period, he had to devote half of his working time to the “Quality” service of the “Operations” department in order to contribute to the updating of part of the OHIM Quality Management System Manual. 12 On 31 March 2011, the applicant was warned by his line managers that his output was considered to be unsatisfactory. Following a meeting, he received monthly production requests, indicating the number of points which he was expected to achieve each month, in respect of the period from 1 April 2011 to October 2011. Those requests stated that: “[t]he purpose of this production request is to set individual targets on a monthly basis. The request is a result of the fact that [the applicant’s] performance over the last [few] years has not been satisfactory.” 13 On 9 June 2011, the reporting officer sent the applicant an email containing the following sentence: “[Mr B.] told me to congratulate you for having changed the path towards the good direction (his words).” 14 On 2 September 2011, the reporting officer sent an email stating, inter alia: “You have been the top producer (honestly!) of the service the last 3-4 months.” 4. The appraisal procedure 15 On 20 October 2011, the applicant was invited to the formal appraisal interview. During that interview, Ms A, his reporting officer, stated that she was satisfied with the applicant’s work and informed him that she would propose level 5 as a general assessment. 16 On 25 October 2011, pursuant to Article 17 and 17a of the Staff Regulations, the applicant informed OHIM of his intention to publish an article by sending an email to this effect to the President of OHIM and to Ms A attaching that article, entitled “Ensuring Greater Legal Certainty in OHIM Decision-Taking by Abandoning Legal Formalism.” That article was published in The Journal of Intellectual Property Law & Practice. 17 According to the application: “[t]he article is a critical analysis of OHIM’s legal practice in relation, in particular, to the taking of opposition decisions. OHIM’s legal practice in this regard was largely established while Mr [X] … was President of OHIM between 2000 and 2010. The article also critically examines the human resource policies executed during Mr [Y’s] tenure as President, some of which have since been ruled unlawful by the Civil Service Tribunal … Mr [B] was [h]ead of Human Resources at the time these policies were implemented, and is now [h]ead of [the] ‘Operations’ [department].” 18 On 15 November 2011, the applicant received an email from Ms A which contained the following sentence: “I would also like to talk with you about your article due to feedback from [Mr B].” 19 Following that email, the applicant met, on 17 November 2011, with Ms A, then with Mr B. 20 On 9 January 2012, the applicant received his appraisal report in respect of the period from 1 October 2010 to 30 September 2011 (“the contested appraisal report”). 5. The contested appraisal report 21 The contested appraisal report starts with the “Objectives” section. Those objectives concern the quantity of decisions, the observance of time-limits, the quality of decisions (individual objectives), teamwork within OHIM (an objective common to all staff) and “quality, simplification and excellence” (an objective common to the staff in the “Operations” department). One column in the section is dedicated to the reporting officer’s comments on the objectives. The second section, entitled “Competencies”, covers the following competencies: “[a]nalysis, problem solving and judgment”, “[c]ommunication”, “[m]anagement and leadership”, “[p]rofessional knowledge and development”, “[q]uality and results orientation”, “[s]elf management” and “[w]orking with others and interpersonal relations”. In respect of each of those competencies, the appraisal report mentions the “[r]equired level”, which corresponds to the level which OHIM expects of the holder of the post and the “[l]evel” which is that actually attained by the holder according to the reporting officer’s appraisal. In that regard, the reporting officer has a choice of [the] five [following] levels: [K (Basic level), P (Proficient level), M (Master level), E (Expert level) and O (a learning phase for acquiring this competency)]. One column in the section is dedicated to the reporting officer’s comments on the objectives. 22 The following part of the appraisal report is headed “Conduct in the service — [Reporting Officer’s] comments”. The contested appraisal report also contains, inter alia, the sections “General assessment”, “Reporting officer’s assessment” and “Countersigning [o]fficer’s comments”. 23 In respect of the general assessment, the reporting officer has a choice of 7 levels. Levels 5 and 6 correspond to the following descriptions: “[5] The efficiency, the abilities and the aspects of conduct appraised are acceptable despite some weak points. [6] The efficiency, the abilities and the aspects of conduct appraised do not correspond to the level required for the post occupied. Improvements are needed.” 24 Under the objective concerning the quantity of decisions, the comments of the reporting officer in the contested appraisal report are worded as follows: “Volume: Adjusted target: 105.4 p[oints] (50% … work [in the ‘Quality’ service] for 2 [months]). [The applicant] did 87.6 p[oints] which corresponds to 83% of [the] target. Timeliness: 95.62% on time, which is above [the] service/dep[artment] average (94%). Quality: [the applicant] can improve the quality of his decisions vis-a-vis [OHIM] practice and should concentrate on this issue during the next appraisal period.” 25 In the “Competencies” section, it is stated in respect of the “[q]uality and results orientation” competency that: “Following feedback from [the applicant’s] co-signers his first drafts were not always aligned with the [OHIM Quality Management System M]anual. His output has room for improvement. He did 87.6 points which is 17% below the expected target.” The required level is “M”. The applicant obtained “K”. 26 In respect of the “[s]elf management” competency: “[The applicant] needs to be more committed to the work and to his own development. He needs to find a good working method in order to have a higher output and must avoid working in spurts and achieve a more even pace.” The required level is “P”. The applicant obtained “K”. 27 In respect of the “[w]orking with others and interpersonal relations” competency: “… [The applicant] tends to leave a glut of work to the last week of the month which meant that a lot of strain was put on his co-signers who were asked to sign a very large amount of decisions at a time when they too had targets to consider.” The required level is “M”. The applicant obtained “P”. 28 In the “Conduct in the service — [Reporting Officer’s] comments” section, the contested appraisal report contains the following comments: “Being a native English speaker, [the applicant] was co-signing and proofreading the opposition decisions of his colleagues. This part of his work was much appreciated. In March 2011 [the applicant’s] underperformance was raised by his managers. It was only from that moment on that [the applicant] started to perform as expected.” 29 In the “General assessment” section, the reporting officer selected the option corresponding to level 6, which states as follows: “The efficiency, the abilities and the aspects of conduct appraised do not correspond to the level required for the post occupied. Improvements are needed.” 30 In the “Reporting officer’s assessment” section, the contested appraisal report contains the following assessment: “[The applicant] undoubtedly put in a lot of effort in the last half of the year to reach his target. However, the positive aspect of this achievement must be weighed against the fact that [the applicant’s] very low performance earlier in the year meant that he had left himself a lot to catch up on. This low performance was noted by [his line managers] who warned [the applicant] that he was underperforming and special arrangements, reserved to underperforming examiners, were put in place in April. From then on [the applicant] performed according to expectations. Since the standard of the department establishes that [it may be considered that a [jobholder] ‘does not correspond to the level’ where he has met only 80% of his objectives] and since it is clear for the [reporting officer] that the global performance of [the applicant] during the appraisal period [cannot] be evaluated as satisfactory, the first level of unsatisfactory assessment [was] selected.” 6. The conciliation meeting, the action before the Joint Evaluation and Promotion Committee and the complaint 31 Having received the contested appraisal report, the applicant requested a conciliation meeting with the reporting officer and the countersigning officer. The applicant was requested by his head of department and countersigning officer to provide a brief overview of the questions which he wished to address. As a result of that request, the applicant sent his reporting officer and countersigning officer the following email on 25 January 2012: “In short, I had an appraisal meeting in October with my [l]ine [m]anager which started with the words ‘… I have nothing negative to say, it is all positive’. The interview was indeed positive. Three months later I received an [a]ppraisal [r]eport which marked my performance as needing improvement. A number of negative comments were contained in the [r]eport, including the allegation that the quality of my decisions did not meet expectations — an allegation I challenge. I would like to know how we got from the one situation (the interview) to the other (the [r]eport). My [l]ine [m]anager informs me that she initially wrote a more positive report in which I was adjudged to have met the level required, but that it was changed at the insistence of my [h]ead of [d]epartment. I would like the negative comments removed from my report since they are incorrect and for my performance to be marked as meeting requirements.” 32 The conciliation meeting took place on 25 January 2012. 33 On 13 February 2012, the applicant brought an action before the Joint Evaluation and Promotion Committee (“the JEPC”) concerning the general assessment contained in the contested appraisal report. On 20 February 2012, the reporting officer submitted observations. On 22 February 2012, the applicant sent his response to the reporting officer’s comments to the JEPC. 34 By letter of 29 March 2012, the JEPC requested additional information from the reporting officer, in particular “details regarding production (quantity and quality wise), especially how staff with comparable production [to the applicant] were assessed …”. The reporting officer replied on 16 April 2012. On 19 April 2012, the applicant replied to the reporting officer’s response. 35 On 15 May 2012, the JEPC issued its unanimous findings on the applicant’s action in the following terms: “In accordance with the information given by the [r]eporting [o]fficer, the jobholder was expected to co-sign double the decisions he was expected to [draft]. Since the jobholder [drafted] 65 decisions, which corresponds to 83% of the decisions he was expected to [draft], he should have co-signed 156 decisions. Hence he fulfilled this target. Furthermore, the jobholder [stated] that all these decisions as well as numerous other decisions were [proofread] by him. Regarding timeliness, the jobholder performed slightly above the target. Considering all the facts, it must be held that the performance of the jobholder is — as far [as] it concerns the quantity of decisions taken — below the target, but not as low as to qualify his output as ‘[does] not correspond to the level required’. In accordance with the information given by the [r]eporting [o]fficer, such assessment is only given if the performance [is] 20% [or more] below target. In all other areas, the jobholder performed in accordance with the targets or above. Even after being invited to do so, the [r]eporting [o]fficer (‘Ms [A]’) could not specify at all why the quality of decisions was below the target set. … The general assessment has to take into consideration all competencies and objectives. Consequently, the JEPC finds the [action] well founded and recommends to raise the [general] assessment to ‘acceptable despite some weak points’.” 36 On 22 May 2012, the reporting officer and the countersigning officer sent the applicant a note informing him that they did not intend to raise his general assessment. The note also stated: “The reporting officer … has decided to follow the JEPC recommendations as regards the quality. Therefore all eventual criticism on the quality of [the applicant’s] work has been removed from the report … .” 37 On 21 August 2012, the applicant filed a complaint against the contested appraisal report. On 17 December 2012, the applicant received the decision of 12 December 2012 rejecting the complaint.’