I was wondering how useful your schools' marking policy was to you as a teacher and, of course, to your pupils.

Marking policies are there to help teachers have a common framework by which they can regularly assess their pupils; this is useful enough and many have a timeframe attached.  For example, they may state that marking must be carried out every three weeks.

Clearly, the idea is that pupils need regular feedback on their written work and this is often interpreted by time-pressured teachers who quickly tick through notes and add depth to one 'substantial' piece of writing. This is an example of an asynchronous process and, in my opinion, it is not particularly helpful for pupils or teachers!

The depth of the feedback offered can be as detailed as anyone may ask: literacy/numeracy comments, next steps, grades or levels, literacy/numeracy levels and feedback by pupils. The best assessment, however, is not driven by imposed windows of time.

Daniel Edwards (read: @headguruteacher) was absolutely correct when he argued that too often we misjudge the impact of our work relative to the effort we have put in. He is right to focus on curriculum, timetabling, performance management and assessment 'overkill'; these all offer plenty of inefficiency and I fully agree that you really can have too much data.  

This last is quite a statement and I know that in the past I have been known as a full on data fiend. It was, however, appropriate to its' context. I had started at a school in Special Measures and data in English was all but non-existent. What there was lacked rigour and too many pupils were able to slip through the net. This situation demanded a focused approach to gathering, interpreting and using data; the investment in time into this collation of data was appropriate, because the department was now able to monitor, support and improve the learning of pupils.