Human Resources

Performance appraisals - include the identification, measurement, and management of human performance in organizations

Identification - determining what areas of work the manager should be examining when measuring performance

Measurement - making managerial judgments of how "good" or "bad" employee performance was

Management - the overriding goal of any appraisal system

- appraisals should be more than a past-oriented activity that criticizes or praises workers for their previous performance

- must take a future-oriented view of what workers can do to achieve their potential in the organization.

Competencies - observable characteristics people bring with them in order to perform a job successfully

- defining competencies as underlying and unseen characteristics leads to the same difficulties associated with using personality traits as performance measures (discussed in the following section)

Competency model - set of competencies associated with a job

Measurement tools can be classified in two ways:

- by the type of judgment that is required (relative or absolute)

- by the focus of the measure (trait, behavior, or outcome)

Relative Rating Systems:

- advantage of forcing supervisors to differentiate among their workers

- most HR specialists believe the disadvantages of relative rating systems outweigh their advantages

- relative judgments (such as ranks) do not make clear how great or small the differences between employees are

- such systems do not provide any absolute information, so managers cannot determine how good or poor employees at the extreme rankings are

- relative ranking systems force managers to identify differences among workers where none may truly exist which can cause conflict among workers

- relative systems typically require assessment of overall performance which makes performance feedback ambiguous and of questionable value

Absolute Judgment Systems:

Advantages - theoretically, absolute formats allow employees from different work groups to be compared to one another

- if all employees are excellent workers, they all can receive excellent ratings

- because ratings are made on separate dimensions of performance, the feedback to the employee can be more specific and helpful

- also viewed as more fair than relative formats

- avoid creating conflict among workers

- easier to legally defend than relative judgment systems

Disadvantages - all workers in a group can receive the same evaluation if the supervisor is reluctant to differentiate among workers

- different supervisors can have markedly different evaluation standards

Trait Appraisal Instruments:

- have been criticized for being too ambiguous & for leaving the door open for conscious or unconscious bias

- because of their ambiguous nature, are less defensible in court

- definitions of reliability can differ dramatically across supervisors

- assessment of traits also focuses on the person rather than on performance,

- can make employees defensive

- this approach is not conducive to performance development

Behavioral Appraisal Instruments:

Advantages - performance standards are unambiguous and observable

- because behaviors are unambiguous and based on observation, behavioral instruments are more legally defensible than trait scales

- behavioral scales also provide employees with specific examples of the types of behaviors to engage in or avoid

- they encourage supervisors to be specific in their performance