Performance Appraisal

What?
Performance appraisal, also known as employee appraisal, is a method by which the job performance of an employee is evaluated (generally in terms of quality, quantity, cost and time). Performance appraisal is a part of career development.

Why performance Appraisal??

-Validate selection techniques and human resource policies to meet our goals -Give feedback on performance to employees. -Provide the opportunity for organizational diagnosis and development. -Facilitate communication between members and head. -Identify members training needs. -provide a mechanism to improve individual/organizational performance as necessary. -use performance as a basis for appropriate personnel actions, including rewarding noteworthy performance and taking action to improve less than successful performance.

To accomplish these objectives:

-identify organizational goals to be accomplished -identify individuals goals . -communicate individual and organizational goals to members that support the overall mission . -monitor and evaluate employee performance.

The systematic process of performance management :

planning work and setting expectations continually monitoring performance

developing the capacity to perform

periodically rating performance in a summary fashion; and rewarding good performance

1 - PLANNING
This includes: 1-setting performance expectations and goals for individuals in order to channel efforts toward achieving organizational objectives. Involving employees in the planning process is essential to their understanding of the goals of the organization, what needs to be done, why it needs to be done, and expectations for accomplishing goals. 2- establishing the elements and standards in their EPAP (EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL PLANS )

STANDARDS
The performance standards are expressions of the performance threshold(s), requirement(s), or expectation(s) that must be met for each element at a particular level of performance. They must be focused on results and include credible measures such as: QUALITY, QUANTITY

TIMELINESS

COST-EFFECTIVENESS

2 - MONITORING
Designing effective feedback into a performance management program will improve individual and team performance and will make your organization more effective. With effective feedback processes, employees can see their progress and that motivates them to reach their performance goals successfully.

When providing feedback, the following concepts should be kept in mind:

Feedback works best when it relates to a specific goal
Employees should receive information about how they are doing in as timely a fashion as possible.

Feedback should be given in a manner that will best help improve performance.
Document the performance

Some issues that may be discussed in a performance review:

Communication
Training Needs (formal, on-the-job, etc.)

Sufficiency of skills and knowledge level for successful performance

Status of work (challenging, fulfilling)

Delegation of assignments

Getting/giving regular feedback

3 DEVELOPING EMPLOYEES
informal employee development, which can take a wide variety of forms: -Feedback -Job rotations and special assignments -Coaching and counseling -Mentoring -Using the manager as an informal teacher -Self-development

4 - RATING

Within the context of formal performance appraisal requirements, rating means evaluating employee performance against the elements and standards in an employee's performance appraisal plan and assigning a rating of record.

During the meeting, the rating official should do the following:

Be professional, calm and focused on performance issues. Begin with positive feedback on tasks the employee has done well regardless of what the final rating is. Go through each element and discuss items of note, both positive and negative as appropriate and assign a rating. Provide specific examples when possible. Describe any changes in performance required and ensure the employee understands. Allow for employee questions and input throughout. Summarize the performance and assign the rating of record.

5 - ACTIONS BASED ON PERFORMANCE

How?
The most popular methods that are being used as performance appraisal process are:
Management by objectives 360 degree appraisal Behavioral Observation Scale Behaviorally Anchored Rating Scale Trait based system which should be avoided for the following reasons:

 they make it difficult for a manager to provide feedback that can cause positive change in employee performance.
For example, a person who lacks integrity stops lying to a manager because he has been caught, but he still have low integrity and lies again when the threat of being caught is gone.

they are vague because a manager can make biased decisions without having to back them up with specific behavioral information.

Management by objectives
is a process of agreeing upon objectives within an organization. Objectives for MBO must be SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and TimeSpecific). Limitations:
It puts too much importance for goals rather than the actual plan. It puts too little concern for the environment in which the goals are set.

360 degree appraisal

is employee development feedback that comes from all around the employee. The feedback would come from subordinates, peers, managers & self-assessment. improvement in a leaders consideration will lead to positive changes in employees' job satisfaction and engagement, and reduce their intent to leave.

360 degree appraisal (Cont.)

It enables leaders to:
Take advantage of under-utilized personnel strengths to increase productivity Avoid the trap of counting on skills that may be weak in the organization Apply human assets data to the valuation of the organization Make succession planning more accurate Design more efficient coaching and training initiatives Support the organization in marketing the skills of its members

360 degree appraisal (Cont.)

Why organizations may not adopt the 360 degree approach Return on investment, for the time and energy required, is perceived to be minimal. Transparent feedback can be adversely affected by emotions and ongoing peer conflicts. Appraisees are not ready for honest and open feedback. Some cultures rigidly avoid passing negative feedback, or information, to superiors or elders.

Behavioral Observation Scale

Rating system used in identifying how often employees or trainees display the preferred behavior. Good behavior will produce good performance, bad behavior will be a distortion. The key factor of measurement in this method is determining the behaviors in workplace that related to the success or the failure, partially or generally, to the jobs. The instrument of BOS is ordinal scale questionnaires.

Behaviorally Anchored Rating Scale

to construct BARS steps are:
Examples of effective and ineffective behavior related to job are collected from people with knowledge of job. These behaviors are converted in to performance dimensions. A group of participants will be asked to reclassify the incidents. At this stage the incidents for which there is not 75% agreement are discarded as being too subjective. Then the above mentioned incidents are rated from one to nine on a scale.

Creating S.M.A.R.T.E.R. Goals

Specific Measurable Attainable Realistic Tangible Evaluate Re-do

Specific
Specific - A specific goal has a much greater chance of being accomplished than a general goal. To set a specific goal you must answer the six "W" questions: *Who: Who is involved? *What: What do I want to accomplish? *Where: Identify a location. *When: Establish a time frame. *Which: Identify requirements and constraints. *Why: Specific reasons, purpose or benefits of accomplishing the goal. EXAMPLE: A general goal would be, "Get in shape." But a specific goal would say, "Join a health club and workout 3 days a week."

Measurable
Measurable - Establish concrete criteria for measuring progress toward the attainment of each goal you set. When you measure your progress, you stay on track, reach your target dates. To determine if your goal is measurable, ask questions such as......How much? How many? How will I know when it is accomplished?

Attainable
Attainable - When you identify goals that are most important to you, you begin to figure out ways you can make them come true. You develop the attitudes, abilities, skills, and financial capacity to reach them. You begin seeing previously overlooked opportunities to bring yourself closer to the achievement of your goals. You can attain most any goal you set when you plan your steps wisely and establish a time frame that allows you to carry out those steps

Realistic
Realistic - goal must represent an objective you are willing and able to work. A goal can be both high and realistic; you decide just how high your goal should be.. A high goal is frequently easier to reach than a low one because a low goal exerts low motivational force Your goal is realistic if you truly believe that it can be accomplished. determine if you have accomplished anything similar in the past or ask yourself what conditions would have to exist to accomplish this goal.

Tangible
Tangible - A goal is tangible when you can experience it with one of the senses, that is, taste, touch, smell, sight or hearing. When your goal is tangible, or when you tie an tangible goal to a intangible goal, you have a better chance of making it specific and measurable and thus attainable.

Evaluate
Evaluate - Your goals are not set in stone and will change from time to time. Constant evaluation of your goals is essential to reaching your goals. Change factors must be taken into consideration during your evaluation. Factors such as change in volunteer status, change in family or job responsibilities, or change in available resources may affect your stated goals.

Re-do
Re-do - After a careful evaluation then you should re-do the goals that need changing and continue the SMARTER goal setting process. The process of developing, initiating and following through on the SMARTER goals setting model is cyclical and should be continually worked on.