APPRAISAL PROCESS
1. Objectives of Appraisal
Objectives of appraisal as stated above include effecting promotions and transfers, assessing training needs, awarding pay increases, and the like. The emphasis in all these is to correct problems. Theses objectives are appropriate as long as the approach in appraisal is individual. Appraisal in future, would assume systems orientations. In the systems approach, the objectives of appraisal stretch beyond the traditional ones.
In the systems approach, appraisal aims at improving the performance, instead of merely assessing it. Towards this end, an appraisal system seeks to evaluate opportunity factors. Opportunity factors include the physical environment such as noise, ventilation and lightings, available resources such as human and computer assistance and social processes such as leadership effectiveness. These opportunity variables are more important than individual abilities in determining work performance.
In the systems approach the emphasis is not on individual assessment and rewards or punishments. But it is on how work the work system affects an individual’s.
In the systems approach the emphasis is not on individual assessment and rewards or punishments. But it is on how the work systems affect an individual’s performance. In order to use a systems approach, managers must learn to appreciate the impact that systems levels factors have on individual performance and subordinates must adjust to lack of competition among individuals. Thus, if a systems approach is going to be successful, the employee must believe that by working towards shared goals, everyone will benefit.
Not that the role of the individual is undermined. The individual is responsible for a large percentage of his or her work performance. Employees should not be encouraged to seek organizational reasons for his failures. The identifications of systems obstacles should be used to facilitate development and motivation, not as an excuse to poor performance. The following table displays some of the differences between the traditional approach and the systems-oriented one.
2. Establish Job Expectations
The second step in the appraisal process is to establish job expectations. This includes informing the employee what is expected of him or her on the job. Normally, a discussion is held with his or her superior to review the major duties contained in the job place of formal performance evaluation.
3. Design Appraisal Programme
Designing an appraisal programme poses several questions which we need to answers. They are: -
1. Formals versus informal appraisal
2. Whose performance is to be assessed?
3. Who are the raters?
4. What problems are encountered?
5. How to solve the problems?
6. What should be evaluated?
7. When to evaluate?
8. What methods of appraisal are to be used?
1. Whose performance should be rated? To the question as to whose performance should be rated, the answer is obvious—employees, is it individual or teams? Specifically the rate may be defined as the individual, work group, division, or organizations. It is also possible to define the rate at multiple levels. For example, under some condition, it may be desirable to appraise performance both at work-group level for merit-pay increases and at the individual level to assess training needs. Two conditions necessitate a group level appraisal—group cohesiveness and difficulty in identifying individual performance. Description. Individual should not be expected to begin the job until they understand what is expected out of them.
2. Formal V/s informal appraisal: - the first step in designing an appraisal programme is to decide whether the appraisal should be formal or informal. Formal appraisal usually occurs at specified time periods—once or twice year. Formal appraisals are most often required by the organizations for the purposes of employee evaluation. Informal performance appraisal can occur whenever the superior feels the need for communication. For example, if the employee has been consistently meeting or executing standards, an informal appraisal may be in order to simply recognize this fact. Discussions can take place anywhere in the organizations, ranging from the managers office to the canteen. But care needs to be taken to ensure that the discussion is held in private. Many organizations encourage a mixture of both formal and informal appraisal. The formal appraisal is most often used as primary evaluation. However, the informal appraisal is very helpful for more performance feedback. Informal appraisal should not take the Group cohesiveness refers to shared feeling among work-team members. There is cooperation and clear understanding to accomplish tasks which are interdependent. Any attempt to assess individual performance shall undermine group cohesiveness and tend to promote individualistic or even competitive orientation. The difficulty in identifying individual contribution is also important to consider. In some cases, interdependent of tasks is so complete that it is difficult to identify who has contributed what. There is no other choice but to view that task as a team effort. But the point to be remembered is that the performance of all employees must be rated. All must become raters.
3. Who are Raters? Raters can be immediate supervisors, specialist from the HR department, subordinates. Peers, committees, clients, self appraisal, or a combination of several.
a. Immediate supervisor is the fit candidate to appraise the performance of his or her subordinate. There are 3 reasons in support of this choice. No one is familiar with the subordinate’s performance than his or her superior. Another reason is that the superior has the responsibility of managing a particular unit. When the tasks of evaluating a subordinate is given to another person, the superior authority may be undermined seriously. Finally, training and development of subordinate is am portent element in every mangers job. Since appraisal programme are often clearly linked to training and development, the immediate superior may be the legal choice to conduct the performance evaluation.
b. Subordinate can assess the performance of their superiors. The use of this choice may be useful in assessing an employee ability to communicate, delegate work, allocate resources, disseminate information, resolve intra-personal conflict, and deal with employees on a fair basis. But the problem with the subordinate evaluation is that supervisors tend to become popular, not by effective leadership, but by mere gimmicks.
c. Peers are in better position to evaluate certain facts of job performance which the subordinates or supervisors cannot do. Such facts include contribution skills, reliability and initiative. Closeness of the working relationships and the amount of personal contacts place peers in a better position to make accurate assessments. Unfortunately friendship or animosity may result in distortion of evaluation. Further when reward allocation is based on peer evaluation, series conflicts among co-workers may develop. Finally join together to rate each other high.
d. Although clients are seldom used for rating employee performance, nothing prevents an organization from using this source. Clients may be members within the organization who have direct contact with the rate and make use of an output (goods or services) this employee provides. Interest, courtesy, dependability and innovativeness are but a few of the qualities for which clients can offer rating information. Clients, external to the organization can also offer similar kinds of information. Where appraisal is made by the superior, peers, subordinates and clients, it is called the 360-degree system of appraisal. First developed at General Electric, US in 1992 the system has become popular in our country too. GE (India). Reliance Industries, Crompton Greaves, Godrej Soaps, Wipro, Infosys, Thermax and Thomas Cook are using the method with greater benefits. The Arthur Anderson Survey 1997 reveals that 20% of the organization use 360 degree method. In the 360 degree method, besides assessing performance. Other attributes of the assess—talents, behavioral quirks, values, ethical standards, tempers and loyalty are evaluated by the people who are best placed to do it. Many employees use rating committees to evaluate employees. These committees are often composed of the employee’s immediate supervisor and three or four other supervisors who come in contact with the employee. This choice is welcome when an employee in the course of his or her job performs a variety of tasks in different environment. For e.g. 1supervisor may work with the employee when technical aspects of a job are being performed and another supervisor may deal with the same employee in situations where communications skills are crucial. There are several benefits in using multiple raters. First there may be objectivity in rating as more than rater is involved in the assessment. Furthermore where there are differences in the rater ought ratings they usually stem from the fact that raters at different level in the organization often observe different facets of an employee performance-the appraisal to reflect these differences. The disadvantages of committee rating are that it diminishes the role of the immediate supervisor in the area of training and development.
e. In self –appraisal employee himself or herself evaluates his or her own performance. Indian Telephone Industries has been following the self-appraisal system for executives in grade I to IV. Hewlett-Packard and Texas Instruments too ask their performance to prepare their own appraisal. On the positive side it may be stated that in self-appraisal there is an opportunity to participate in evaluation particularly if it is combine with goal setti9ng and this should be improve the mangers motivation. Managers are less defensive in self-evaluation than when supervisors tell them what they are. Self-appraisal is best suited where executive development is the main purpose of evaluation as the approach enablers’ managers to clearly assess their areas of differences. Unfortunately self-appraisal falls short almost by any criterion. They tend to be more lenient compared to other sources of evaluation, even that of peers who are more lenient than their superiors. Self-appraisal is also more likely to be less biased and less in agreement with judgment of others. In practice a combination of methods is followed for employee. For example evaluation by self may be followed by a superior, the personal department or the HR department (following diagram).
1. Objectives of Appraisal
Objectives of appraisal as stated above include effecting promotions and transfers, assessing training needs, awarding pay increases, and the like. The emphasis in all these is to correct problems. Theses objectives are appropriate as long as the approach in appraisal is individual. Appraisal in future, would assume systems orientations. In the systems approach, the objectives of appraisal stretch beyond the traditional ones.
In the systems approach, appraisal aims at improving the performance, instead of merely assessing it. Towards this end, an appraisal system seeks to evaluate opportunity factors. Opportunity factors include the physical environment such as noise, ventilation and lightings, available resources such as human and computer assistance and social processes such as leadership effectiveness. These opportunity variables are more important than individual abilities in determining work performance.
In the systems approach the emphasis is not on individual assessment and rewards or punishments. But it is on how work the work system affects an individual’s.
In the systems approach the emphasis is not on individual assessment and rewards or punishments. But it is on how the work systems affect an individual’s performance. In order to use a systems approach, managers must learn to appreciate the impact that systems levels factors have on individual performance and subordinates must adjust to lack of competition among individuals. Thus, if a systems approach is going to be successful, the employee must believe that by working towards shared goals, everyone will benefit.
Not that the role of the individual is undermined. The individual is responsible for a large percentage of his or her work performance. Employees should not be encouraged to seek organizational reasons for his failures. The identifications of systems obstacles should be used to facilitate development and motivation, not as an excuse to poor performance. The following table displays some of the differences between the traditional approach and the systems-oriented one.
2. Establish Job Expectations
The second step in the appraisal process is to establish job expectations. This includes informing the employee what is expected of him or her on the job. Normally, a discussion is held with his or her superior to review the major duties contained in the job place of formal performance evaluation.
3. Design Appraisal Programme
Designing an appraisal programme poses several questions which we need to answers. They are: -
1. Formals versus informal appraisal
2. Whose performance is to be assessed?
3. Who are the raters?
4. What problems are encountered?
5. How to solve the problems?
6. What should be evaluated?
7. When to evaluate?
8. What methods of appraisal are to be used?
1. Whose performance should be rated? To the question as to whose performance should be rated, the answer is obvious—employees, is it individual or teams? Specifically the rate may be defined as the individual, work group, division, or organizations. It is also possible to define the rate at multiple levels. For example, under some condition, it may be desirable to appraise performance both at work-group level for merit-pay increases and at the individual level to assess training needs. Two conditions necessitate a group level appraisal—group cohesiveness and difficulty in identifying individual performance. Description. Individual should not be expected to begin the job until they understand what is expected out of them.
2. Formal V/s informal appraisal: - the first step in designing an appraisal programme is to decide whether the appraisal should be formal or informal. Formal appraisal usually occurs at specified time periods—once or twice year. Formal appraisals are most often required by the organizations for the purposes of employee evaluation. Informal performance appraisal can occur whenever the superior feels the need for communication. For example, if the employee has been consistently meeting or executing standards, an informal appraisal may be in order to simply recognize this fact. Discussions can take place anywhere in the organizations, ranging from the managers office to the canteen. But care needs to be taken to ensure that the discussion is held in private. Many organizations encourage a mixture of both formal and informal appraisal. The formal appraisal is most often used as primary evaluation. However, the informal appraisal is very helpful for more performance feedback. Informal appraisal should not take the Group cohesiveness refers to shared feeling among work-team members. There is cooperation and clear understanding to accomplish tasks which are interdependent. Any attempt to assess individual performance shall undermine group cohesiveness and tend to promote individualistic or even competitive orientation. The difficulty in identifying individual contribution is also important to consider. In some cases, interdependent of tasks is so complete that it is difficult to identify who has contributed what. There is no other choice but to view that task as a team effort. But the point to be remembered is that the performance of all employees must be rated. All must become raters.
3. Who are Raters? Raters can be immediate supervisors, specialist from the HR department, subordinates. Peers, committees, clients, self appraisal, or a combination of several.
a. Immediate supervisor is the fit candidate to appraise the performance of his or her subordinate. There are 3 reasons in support of this choice. No one is familiar with the subordinate’s performance than his or her superior. Another reason is that the superior has the responsibility of managing a particular unit. When the tasks of evaluating a subordinate is given to another person, the superior authority may be undermined seriously. Finally, training and development of subordinate is am portent element in every mangers job. Since appraisal programme are often clearly linked to training and development, the immediate superior may be the legal choice to conduct the performance evaluation.
b. Subordinate can assess the performance of their superiors. The use of this choice may be useful in assessing an employee ability to communicate, delegate work, allocate resources, disseminate information, resolve intra-personal conflict, and deal with employees on a fair basis. But the problem with the subordinate evaluation is that supervisors tend to become popular, not by effective leadership, but by mere gimmicks.
c. Peers are in better position to evaluate certain facts of job performance which the subordinates or supervisors cannot do. Such facts include contribution skills, reliability and initiative. Closeness of the working relationships and the amount of personal contacts place peers in a better position to make accurate assessments. Unfortunately friendship or animosity may result in distortion of evaluation. Further when reward allocation is based on peer evaluation, series conflicts among co-workers may develop. Finally join together to rate each other high.
d. Although clients are seldom used for rating employee performance, nothing prevents an organization from using this source. Clients may be members within the organization who have direct contact with the rate and make use of an output (goods or services) this employee provides. Interest, courtesy, dependability and innovativeness are but a few of the qualities for which clients can offer rating information. Clients, external to the organization can also offer similar kinds of information. Where appraisal is made by the superior, peers, subordinates and clients, it is called the 360-degree system of appraisal. First developed at General Electric, US in 1992 the system has become popular in our country too. GE (India). Reliance Industries, Crompton Greaves, Godrej Soaps, Wipro, Infosys, Thermax and Thomas Cook are using the method with greater benefits. The Arthur Anderson Survey 1997 reveals that 20% of the organization use 360 degree method. In the 360 degree method, besides assessing performance. Other attributes of the assess—talents, behavioral quirks, values, ethical standards, tempers and loyalty are evaluated by the people who are best placed to do it. Many employees use rating committees to evaluate employees. These committees are often composed of the employee’s immediate supervisor and three or four other supervisors who come in contact with the employee. This choice is welcome when an employee in the course of his or her job performs a variety of tasks in different environment. For e.g. 1supervisor may work with the employee when technical aspects of a job are being performed and another supervisor may deal with the same employee in situations where communications skills are crucial. There are several benefits in using multiple raters. First there may be objectivity in rating as more than rater is involved in the assessment. Furthermore where there are differences in the rater ought ratings they usually stem from the fact that raters at different level in the organization often observe different facets of an employee performance-the appraisal to reflect these differences. The disadvantages of committee rating are that it diminishes the role of the immediate supervisor in the area of training and development.
e. In self –appraisal employee himself or herself evaluates his or her own performance. Indian Telephone Industries has been following the self-appraisal system for executives in grade I to IV. Hewlett-Packard and Texas Instruments too ask their performance to prepare their own appraisal. On the positive side it may be stated that in self-appraisal there is an opportunity to participate in evaluation particularly if it is combine with goal setti9ng and this should be improve the mangers motivation. Managers are less defensive in self-evaluation than when supervisors tell them what they are. Self-appraisal is best suited where executive development is the main purpose of evaluation as the approach enablers’ managers to clearly assess their areas of differences. Unfortunately self-appraisal falls short almost by any criterion. They tend to be more lenient compared to other sources of evaluation, even that of peers who are more lenient than their superiors. Self-appraisal is also more likely to be less biased and less in agreement with judgment of others. In practice a combination of methods is followed for employee. For example evaluation by self may be followed by a superior, the personal department or the HR department (following diagram).