Performance Appraisal Training

After the performance of an employee is appraised, the superior should inform the employee about the level of the employee's performance, the reason for the need for improvement of performance, and the methods of this improvement. The superior should counsel the employee about his performance and the methods of improving it.

Counseling is a planned, systematic intervention in the life of an individual who is capable of choosing the goal and the direction of his own development. Thus the purpose of counseling is to help the employee to be aware of his own performance, his strengths and weaknesses, opportunities available for performance development, and the threats in the form of technological change. Performance counseling can be done in the form of performance interview by the superior.
The post-appraisal interview has been considered by most of the organizations, as well as employees, as the most essential part of any appraisal system. This interview provides the employee the feedback information. It also gives the appraiser an opportunity to explain to the employee his rating, as well as the traits and behavior he has taken into consideration for appraisal.
It also gives the opportunity to the employee to explain his views about the rates, standards or goals, rating scale, internal and external environment, or causes for a low level of performance. Further it helps both the parties to review standards, set new standards based on the reality factors, and helps the appraiser to offer suggestions coach the employee through his advancement.
Thus the post-appraisal interview is designed to achieve certain objectives. The first objective is to let employees know where they stand. The second objective is to help employees do a better job by clarifying what is expected of them. The third objective is to plan opportunities for development and growth. The fourth is to strengthen the superior- subordinate working relationships by developing a mutual agreement of goals. Last but not least, the post-appraisal interview provides an opportunity for employees to express themselves on performance-related issues.

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PHR SPHR Certification and the Employee Performance Appraisal

Candidates that hold PHR or SPHR certifications have proven the highest level of HR achievement in their field. There is a common HR body of knowledge that is developed by the Society of Human Resources and is tested on the exam. If you plan on sitting for the Professional in Human Resources examination you should have at least 2 to 4 years of professional work experience. Candidates sitting for the Senior Professional in Human Resources exam are required to have a minimum of 6 to 8 years of professional Human Resources experience in which the majority of their working time is spend on HR functions. The topic of management and employee performance appraisals is often tested on the exam and you should be aware of the topic and its function in HR. Instead of performance appraisal, organizations can seek improvement from a much broader spectrum. Performance appraisal is a by-product of a management philosophy that emerged in the late 1950s: Management-By-Objective (MBO). This variation of a machine model was based on the idea of assigning employees numerical targets that matched overriding objectives determined by the organization. Individual performance was measured by the employee's success in meeting these various targets, most of which were quantitatively measured. An annual review rated employees on their success or failure in meeting a number of these precisely defined targets.

By the 1980s, the efficacy of MBO and performance appraisals was in question. Many organizations recognized that the MOB-driven appraisal had failed to deliver its promised success, despite years of trying to improve the process. The MBO appraisal failed as a motivator because people were resistant to and dissatisfied with the process and because both supervisors and employees commonly manipulated the data and the supposed objective evidence to ensure desired ratings and compensation outcomes By the 1990s, organizations had dropped the MBO, but didn't drop the performance appraisals. Believing that appraisal was useful or necessary, organizations continued the annual ritual, in most cases because they didn't know what to do instead. Performance appraisals send messages of distrust, and they suppress the human spirit. Instead of motivating people, they reduce employees to dependent, de-motivated people, who are treated as though they need to be prodded and psyched to put forth their best efforts.
While performance appraisals may have been intended to weed out poor performers, they actually insulted everyone across the board. More than a dozen leading business authors, scholars and consultants have condemned and discouraged the use of performance appraisals, including Peter Block, Philip Crosby, Steven Covey, and the late W. Edwards Deming. Covey calls performance appraisals the bloodletting of today's management. Instead, he urges managers to develop win-win agreements with their employees over performance issues. An unintended consequence of Covey's suggestion is that some employers have simply applied his suggestion to the performance model, placing elaborate performance agreement documents in the personnel file, rather than encouraging, on a personal level, the development of win-win understandings based on trust and communication within a relational context, as Covey counsels.
Deming encouraged all managers to have a spontaneous, unplanned and unhurried three-to-four-hour conversation with each of their employees at least once a year, with the primary goal of listening. These conversations would not be for criticism or performance feedback but to take a broader view of the work and for help and understanding on the part of everybody.
Alternatives to performance appraisal will include these ideas:
An organization, because it is a system, can't be significantly improved by focusing on individuals. Choices of commitment and responsibility must be left to individuals if they are to be meaningful and effective. Less structure and control over the individual employee often will result in greater motivation and productivity. Employees can't be motivated to perform their best, but conditions of openness and trust can unleash intrinsic motivation, spirit and heart-felt commitment to organizational goals. Improving the overall system of the organization yields better results than trying to get employees to improve their individual performance. Organizations can survive and grow only if they are freely evolving systems, where variation, differentiation and diversity are valued as pathways to innovation and improvement.

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How To Conduct A Successful Performance Appraisal

Most organisations review the performance of their employees on a regular basis, usually annually. The term appraisal however, is disliked by many, conjuring up images of a superior passing judgement in a god like fashion. The answer must be to establish good relationships between both.

Every manager has to appraise subordinates and the mechanics of it vary from ticking little boxes, through marking on five-point scales, to writing an open ended report. These notes however, are mainly concerned with relationships.
The primary purpose of an appraisal is to help the subordinate.
Reasons for an Appraisal:
- To provide feedback of individual performance.
- To plan for future promotions and successions.
- To assess training and development needs.
- To provide information for salary planning and special awards.
- To contribute to corporate career planning.
The three main principles for appraisal and counselling interviews:
1. Everything written should be shown and shared
- Secrecy breeds suspicion
- Suspicion destroys a counselling relationship
Two specific aspects often withheld are those relating to: -
a) Poor performance
b) Potential promotion.
In the first the secrecy reflects the manager's own anxiety, telling someone they are doing badly is not easy.
The second, promotion, is difficult as telling the subordinate of potential promotion is very likely to be interpreted as definite, with keen disappointment if it does not happen.
If there is something a manager feels they cannot communicate to a subordinate then that is probably a good enough reason to exclude it from the appraisal report.
2. The Appraisal report should be finalised in the presence of the subordinate
- All fair and above board.
3. The subordinate should contribute a major part to the appraisal
- Self-appraisal is particularly effective in two areas.
Attitudes In Relation To Performance:
First, the area of weak performance, most individuals will be surprisingly open and honest about themselves if the appraisal or counselling is a supportive relationship.
Analyse rather than criticise.
Secondly, the area of career progression; managers tend to see a subordinate's future in terms of the other people in the department and how, particularly, the manager's own progression developed.
Giving the subordinate the chance to talk may reveal totally different aspirations.
Emotion:
There is always an element of emotion in appraisal interviewing. Both manager and subordinate each have positive and negative feelings and appreciating what they are can help understanding.
The Manager:
Positive feelings: -
- Wants to be helpful and understanding, but may be inclined to offer
advice too closely related to their own experience. Needs to
remember the subordinate is an individual in their own right.
- Wants to be kind and tolerant and liked by their staff. However, they must be prepared to point out the realities of any situation.
Negative feelings: -
- May be fearful of the interview itself and whether they may make a
mess of it. These fears diminish with practice.
- Fear of the interview becoming emotional and perhaps creating hostility in the subordinate. This is overcome by developing relationships where expression
of feelings is normal.
- May have feelings of envy i.e. the subordinate's youth, health, qualifications
or career opportunities. It is essential to control them.
The Subordinate:
Positive Feelings: -
- Wants to be liked by the boss. However they must not allow this to make them dependent and subservient.
- Wants to be helped to improve.
Negative Feelings: -
The most likely one is fear of criticism of their work or their behaviour. Until the manager allays this fear, the interview will be meaningless and achieve nothing. Only the manager can allay this fear by establishing a counselling relationship, which shows they are fair and can be trusted. It is possible that a member of staff will perform at an acceptable level without motivation, but in many, indeed most cases their results will not reflect their true potential.
A good manager is always conscious of the need to motivate whenever an opportunity occurs. The assessment interview, properly planned, can be the most potent force for improvement.
Attitudes must be understood before motivation can take place:
We all have attitudes, towards work, politics, religion, fluoridation of water and so on. Those, which are the concern of management, are those, which are related to the job.
- Are they positive, neutral or negative?
- In what areas must we know what they think?
- How can we find out what they think?
- How can we influence their thinking?
If the manager knows their own attitudes and those of their staff, then they are better equipped to manage them.
People think in settled, standard ways, dictated by their attitudes, which form, as it were, the filter into their receptiveness. This can even determine what actually does come to their notice.
Some attitudes and beliefs cannot be changed, they are so deeply held, whilst others can fairly easily be changed provided open-mindedness is a strong attitude.
A person's standards will be directly related to their attitudes. If the standard is unacceptable to the manager then it must be changed.
In a group of sales people who have undergone the same selection process to meet the same job description, there will be a considerable overlap of attitudes, but it must not be assumed that each set is identical. People will have their own unique set of attitudes.
We must not fall into the trap of judging others by our own attitudes. e.g.
- What would I do if I were them?
- What would they do if they were me?
Basic attitudes in members of staff which need to be understood by the Manager are:
-To the job.
-To our products.
-To their colleagues.
-To the Company.
-To their manager.
-To their customers.
-To training.
The manager must know what each individual's attitudes are before they can do anything about them, if indeed, anything needs to be done.
- What do they say?
- How do they say it?
- What do they write-?
- How do they express themselves?
- What do they do?
- How do they set about it?
The manager must be constantly on the alert, looking for inconsistencies which will help improve their understanding or provide new information. Chance remarks when off guard often give away the genuine attitude.
Questioning in the formal situation related to attitudes, may be unsuccessful, as the person will be on their guard and will tend to "feed" what they think the manager wants to know.
Where emotions are stimulated attitudes are more clearly displayed.
There is always an inter-relationship in a person's attitudes.
The manager's task is to strengthen desirable attitudes and minimise or eliminate the undesirable ones.
It must be remembered that people can succeed, despite some undesirable attitudes, because other stronger attitudes are dominant. After all it is results that count!
In Summary, The Steps In Successful Performance Appraisal:
1. Review the case history in advance.
2. Listen to the evidence.
3. Discuss diagnosis.
- Don't concentrate on character traits.
- Discuss things that can be improved.
4. Face up to problem areas.
5. Agree a plan of action.
6. Write up a report of the interview.
7. Progress that report.
8. Never discuss a salary review at the appraisal interview.

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Why Performance Appraisals Are Essential

About eight years into my first career (as many of you know I ve had a few), I ranked high enough to have access to files. As any good snooping executive would do, I looked at my folder. To my surprise there was almost nothing in it. Okay, yes, there was the usual tax forms, my original applications, and some outdated references but what was obviously not present was all but a very few performance evaluations. For a moment, I thought it was some kind of trick or joke, and then it dawned on me that I hadn t had a written evaluation in years. Why? Because I kept moving up the levels and around the company, and each time my current supervisor would, with some relief I m sure, figure why waste the time. In fact, once I was told just that, Jane, you got the title, the position, and the money what more do you want? At the moment I agreed. I now realize it was a disservice to me and a risk to the company.

Here s why I am a true believer in the performance evaluation process.

1. (And I really mean when I say this is #1) Good people deserve to be told, in a formal and official way, how and why they are doing well. They also need to be thanked. Too much time is spent on the bottom 10% of staff and woefully little on the people who would be the hardest to replace and missed most. Everyone likes to hear good news from a credible source, yet many executives have a hard time giving praise and showing appreciation. I promise you money isn t enough. Examples are essential. They don t have to be the shining moments but good, solid, specifics as to why individuals and their work is valued. Everyone needs something to hold onto, especially during trying times, (or when competitors are trying to steal your employees).


2. Motivate. Most of us want to improve, expand, or enhance. Performance evaluations provide the opportunity to do so in a way different from our day-to-day normal routine.


3. It s about the employee. For a brief amount in time, the focus is away from the projects, timetable, benchmarks, and is about the individual. Considering how many hours we all contribute to the workplace, isn t it the least individuals can expect? I once had a year-end review walking out of headquarters front door, another on a phone call while my boss drove feverishly to a presentation he was particularly worried about, and finally, and the best, found the forms in an envelope on my desk with a Post It tell me what you think, your raise is in today s paycheck. These are only memorable because they were so ridiculous. Oh, and they never went in my aforementioned file.


4. Avoid passive aggression. The cowardly way to address issues with a staff member is through sarcasm, side comments, or rude e-mails. It takes a certain amount of courage to confront someone in a way that is fair, honest, and to the point. If you believe it enough to say it, you should believe it enough to write it. The evaluation process allows this to happen. It s what you would want, isn t it?
5. Look at the big picture, over time. The evaluation process, hopefully, allows everyone to take an overall view. It s not about the moment, or last week, it s about a period of time and the highs and lows as well as outcomes. I often remind coaching clients that the month in which their performance appraisal is written has to be stellar primarily because many supervisors are so shortsighted. Try to avoid this with your people.


6. Everyone forgets. Here s where self-evaluations are priceless; the employee gets their say and in the process is helping you write the evaluation. It s hard; especially if you have a large number of people reporting to you, to remember everything. Encourage your people to give you details and suggestions. It also is a great gauge of whether the two of you are on the same page and a good predictor of how the conversation will go.


7. Protect yourself. There are a few employees, and I truly believe they are a very small minority, who are vindictive, argumentative, delusional, and/or litigious. I can t tell you how many times I have had supervisors and coaching clients who wanted to take action against an employee only to be told it was impossible because of a lack of a paper trail. No one enjoys this type of documentation but it s an essential part of being a supervisor. I always wrote the most difficult appraisals first. Otherwise, they hung over the entire process, encouraging me to avoid everything and causing a few sleepless nights. Hunker down and do it. I promise you it s a great investment of time.

Writing performance appraisals takes time; more time than you think and more than you probably plan, or want to give. They require dedicated hours, not on-the-run, during conference calls or at the last minute. Whatever amount of time you think you ll need, triple it and you ll be closer to reality.
Also, we expect our employees to be on time and to get work completed on time. So, if evaluations happen in your company the first week of December be ready. Schedule meetings with each of your people and make sure you keep the appointment. It shows you take the process seriously and respect the person.

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360 Performance Appraisal - The Reality Check

This is a breakthrough multi-rater assessment technique because it helps get 360 overhauling about an employee's complete persona. It involves begetting response through structured questionnaire from the bosses, peers as well as the subordinates. Many a time customer's feedback is also included in the account. With this appraisal it becomes easy to identify an apple of boss's eye who could be a brutal bully with other employees mainly his peers and subordinates. The structured questionnaire takes into account parameters such as his hidden talents, approach towards work, behavioral quirks, effective communication skills, ethical standards, values and employee loyalty-scanned, and assorted, checked and counterchecked from peers. The findings are displayed in the form of pie-charts or bar graphs for every parameter.

Merits:
o The structured questionnaire can be set forth as one of effective fact-finding data to gauge employee truths.
o The appraisal helps self-correction especially for the ones with inflexible styles of management.
o Helps recognize potential talent and initiate potential appraisal for promotion. It also helps identify training needs amongst employees and formulate training modules accordingly.
o Helps design promotion and reward for each and every employee in the organization.
o 360 degree appraisal is better suited to appraise the employee on behavioral and other intangible attributes rather than on hard-core job performance ratings.
o Bring to light the reality show about organizational culture and ambience.
o Helps assess methods used to meet targets and whether they are desirable in the present context or have they lost their importance over the time.
o This all round appraisals serve as a bridge to fill the gap between the employee's self-assessment about himself and his peer's and subordinate's opinion about him.
o Helps employees to be self-aware of their behaviors and how they are perceived by others. It helps them check for the fear of being rated and exposed.
Demerits:
o Often the colleague's responses are biased. Assessments are marked depending upon relationship. Often an employee may be ranked poorly due to jealousy or any other preconceived notion spread about him.
o Is incapable of gauging ratings pertaining to meeting targets.
o Can be used to show down people.

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Performance Appraisals - Improving and Rewarding Employees

As a general rule, managers are apprehensive about having to give performance appraisals to their subordinates. And no wonder. It involves an uncomfortable face-to-face interaction with an employee, who might be performing below his capabilities. In addition, most managers are united in their emphasis that paperwork and standardized forms don't really give a true picture of an employee's worth for the simple reason that there isn't just ONE type of employee in the company.

Why Performance Appraisals Lose Value
Perhaps the biggest reason why performance appraisals lose relevance is because managers are not fully trained and equipped to handle them. In most companies, managers are handed forms, given a couple of basic no brained instructions about how to fill them out and little else. Managers need to be trained in-depth regarding the performance appraisal process, including why it plays such an important role in performance management and the delicate nuances of conducting performance appraisals without insulting or negatively influencing an employee's overall performance. Issuing ultimatums and deadlines to managers to hand in performance appraisal forms is hardly the way to go about a process that plays such a key role in the development of the company's human resource pool, arguably its biggest asset.
Another major reason why performance appraisals (which are unique to American business culture) often fail is because of their standardized nature. Any executive who thinks that evaluating a group of people across many departments of the same company, based on the same rating criteria, is a good enough measurement of their prowess, is living in a fool's paradise. Employees, it has often been noted, perform at different levels depending on the department they are in. A standardized form is, therefore, hardly the way to gauge performance and give recognition.
One more reason performance appraisals fail so miserably is because of the comparing and rating of employees that goes on. If employees pitted against each other and you don't have a motivated team; you get a bunch of resentful, bitter people who are united in their common dislike of the manager!
How to Better Your Performance Appraisal Process
Luckily, performance appraisals in the new millennium has begun to evolve and move away from the old model which was confrontational and loathed by all. New techniques of performance appraisal focus more on the future and ways to improve on the employee's performance rather than harping on past mistakes or shortfalls.
In today's corporate scenario, the appraisal process is more goal oriented and centers on feedback and regular performance review. Whereas in the past, performance appraisals were conducted once a year, the latest methods advocate an ongoing series of face-to-face, discussions between the manager and the employee. This ensures that employee performance remains the focus instead of adopting a criticizing tone as in the past. Companies that want to stay ahead in the 21st century must be able to hold on to their most talented people. This will happen only when managers are trained to honestly evaluate their employees and extract the best characteristics and talents out of them.

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Align Your Performance Appraisal Process With Performance-Based 360-Degree Feedback

Employee development as a science. Consider employee development as a pro-active competency building process that is human resource smart! Integrating your performance appraisals with performance-based 360-feedback will connect and reinforce the competencies and behaviors that can build the effectiveness of your employees and strengthen the ability of your organization to thrive.

Performance appraisals have become much more relevant in recent years. Yet, many appraisals simply do not work. Most are biased or have little or nothing to do with performance. They are ineffective as a motivator to improve performance.
Comparing PA with 360.Typically, the immediate boss is the primary evaluator and key rater (and rating) on a performance appraisal. That rating may not be as accurate as some employees would like, but the boss is the boss and generally his or her rating prevails. Other appraisals include feedback from the employee. Still others include the direct reports when the employee is in a managerial role.
Performance-based 360-feedback measures what people do on the job and how effectively they do it. The 360-degree process includes feedback from the employee or participant and those who surround the participant and interact with him or her on daily-weekly basis--the immediate boss, and depending on the role or position, the direct reports, peers, team members, and customers (internal or external).
Some advanced 360-systems provide employees with directional feedback. Employees clearly understand the strengths they can build upon, what behaviors they need to do more of or less of to become more effective and influential with those they interact with. Typically, performance appraisals do not provide directional feedback.
Performance appraisals have often lacked a developmental component. There is little or no prescribed follow-up and progress-checks to help the employee stay on any identified performance improvement track. Employees receive a performance ranking, yet without a developmental component they may not know which higher priority areas to build upon, nor which areas they need to resolve first to minimize identified weaknesses. Performance-based 360-feedback fills that void.
Aligning feedback with compensation. This can be scary to some folks. Linking a single feedback source with compensation should not be done lightly. The behaviors and practices measured through the feedback process should be treated as a baseline and not as a sole input to the reward process. Nor should employees be compared with a national or industry. If you consider your organization to be unique, then comparing your people with folks from organizations that are not unique, however you define uniqueness, is pointless. Keeping these suggestions in mind can help you avoid problems associated with using subjective criteria for a substantive decision.
Pre- and Post-Assessments. 360-feedback can help you connect multiple feedback sources and developmental processes with compensation. Consider implementing two assessments to employees within a thirteen month period. The pre-assessment acts as a baseline and identifies strengths and areas for development. Training, coaching, and mentoring can help the employee accelerate their developmental efforts.
If your performance appraisal includes ethics and integrity, for example, include them in your 360-assessment and training program(s). Connecting observable behaviors with feedback appraisal processes reinforces those behaviors and underscores their importance to employees.
Monthly follow-up meetings with the immediate manager can reinforce progress towards self-directed action planning efforts. The post-assessment can identify how effectively the employee has applied what they have learned from their developmental efforts. Employees create subsequent action plans based on their post-assessment feedback.
Compensation is not based upon the first or pre-assessment, but a combination of assessments over time.
Compensation Entitlements. You can align and link your performance appraisal process with a pre- and post-assessment process and compensation. The mindset of many people is to expect a raise each year, regardless of their performance. This is a difficult attitude to let go of regardless of the title or function of the employee. People go quiet when they realize that their salary or wage is their compensation for simply showing up at work and performing acceptable or average results. Compensation should not be linked to mediocrity, but to exceeding expectations, for performing beyond expectations. If you reinforce mediocrity you may actually achieve it.
Separate the feedback-appraisal event from the reward-compensation event.
Providing additional compensation, how much and how often, is an important decision for each organization. Consider the following to get you thinking: "Do you compensate people for improving performance? If so, how much do they have to improve? What if they improve, yet are still considered performing in the ineffective range. Should they be given compensation anyway? What if the employee was and continues to be highly effective? What compensation is due to them?" The critical point is to identify why you compensate at all. Is it to reinforce average performance and mediocre performers or performance and performers who consistently exceed expectations?
Door No. 1 or Door No. 2. Some employees get all funny when they hear about 360-feedback or any appraisal process. Consider giving employees a choice with respect to their performance appraisal process. For example, they could remain with the present performance appraisal system (which may or may not be primarily boss-driven feedback). Or they could choose a 270-degree or 360-feedback process along with feedback from other sources, such as your performance appraisal. Once the employee and boss decide which option is appropriate, the employee lives with that option and the feedback results for that appraisal cycle.
The world of performance appraisals has changed. There is a need for a more balanced way to assess performance. The boss may still be the boss, but the employee is becoming more of a partner with that boss. That partnership requires not only top down feedback, but bottom up and side to side feedback as well.
Credible, relevant feedback can help individuals recognize competency and behavioral areas that need improvement. Performance-based 360-feedback can help people understand the consequences of their actions. It can act as a catalyst for change. It enables your employees to create self-directed action plans that guide them in the direction of exceptional performance.
The competitive trend in the marketplace is not simply to appraise performance, but to accelerate and maximize it. Multi-rater feedback helps eliminate bias by providing more balanced feedback from different sources.

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