Human resource managemen

3rd Test

Abstract

Slides 79 - 134
 Performance Appraisal
Performance management: is the process through which managers ensure that employees´ activities and outputs
contribute to the organization´s goals. It requires knowing what activities and outputs are desired, observing whether
they occur, and providing feedback to help employees meet expectations.

Performance Appraisal: evaluating an employee´s current and/or past performance relative to his or her
performance standards.
Setting work standards, assessing performance, and providing feedback to employees to motivate, correct, and continue
their performance.
Purposes: they relate both the employee and the organization.
! Basis for pay and promotion decisions
! Helps correct deficiencies and reinforcing good performance.
! Useful in career planning
! Plays an integral role in performance management
 Ensures the employee performance supports and contributes to the organization strategic aims.

Responsibilities of HR
! Design the performance management system and select the methods and forms to be used for
appraising employees.
! Train managers in conducting performance appraisals.
! Maintain a reporting system to ensure that appraisals are conducted on a timely basis
! Maintain performance appraisal records for individual employees.

Effective performance appraisal

! Effective performance appraisal
 Defining the job and performance criteria
 Appraising performance
 Providing feedback session.

! Approaches for measuring performance

 Directly measuring the results of work performance.
 Rating the extent to which employees have desirable traits believed to be necessary for job
success.
 Rating work behaviors

Methods:
Organizations develop a wide range of
methods to measure an employee´s
performance, they can rank, or compare.
Many systems include a variety of
preceding measures.

Simple ranking: Requires managers to

rank employees in their group from the
highest to the poorest, in a variation
called alternation ranking, managers
work from a list of employees.
Downside: it involves validity
therefore it raises question in regard to
fairness.

Forced-Choice Rating Method of

performance appraisal that requires the
rater to rank a set of statements
describing how an employee carries out
the duties and responsibilities of the job.
It works better if the members of the
group really do vary this much in terms
of their performance.

! For example: the organization might establish the following percentages and categories:
 Exceptional 5%
 Exceeds standards 25%
 Meets standards 55%
 Room for improvement 10%
 Not acceptable 5%

Paired-comparison rating: Method of performance measurement that compares each employee with each other
employee to stablish rankings
Alteration ranking: Ranks employees from most to least valuable.
 Scales
Graphic Rating Method of performance appraisal that requires the rater to indicate on a scale where the employee
rates on factors such as quantity of work, dependability, job knowledge and cooperativeness. It is the most widely used
method for rating attributes.

Mixed-standard: Method of performance measurement that uses several statements describing each trait to produce a
final score for that trait.
Behaviorally Anchored Rating Scale: method of performance appraisal that determines an employee´s level of
performance based on whether or not certain specifically described job behaviors are present. Specific written
statements of actual behaviors that indicate the level of performance on the scale opposite that anchor.

Rating Behaviors
It is a way to overcome drawbacks of rating attributes of employees,
Critical-incident method: Method of performance measurement based on managers records of specific examples of
the employee acting in ways that are either effective or ineffective.
Behaviorally Anchored Rating Scale (BARS) Method of performance measurement that rates behavior in terms of a
scale showing specific statements of behavior that describe different levels of performance. Drawback: can be bias to
the manager´s memory.
Behaviorally Observation Scale (BOS) Variation of BARS which uses all behaviors necessary for effective
performance to rate performance at an specific task Drawback: amount of information required.
Organizational behavior modification (OBM) plan for managing the behavior of employees through a formal system
of feedback and reinforcement. Has 4 components: define a set of key behaviors necessary for the jo, Use of a
measurement system to asses if the employee exhibits key behaviors, Feedback and reinforcement based on behavior.

Measuring Results
Goal Setting : Managers should appraise employees based on previously assigned goals and standards that they are
expecting to achieve. For effective goal setting
! Set SMART goal
 Specific and clearly state the desire results
 Measurable in answering how much
 Attainable and not too tough or too easy
 Relevant to what´s to be achieved
 Timely in reflecting deadlines and milestones.
! Assign
 Specific, challenging but doable and measurable goal
 Encourage participation

Management by Objectives (MBO): is a system in which people at each level of the organization set goals in a
process that flows from top to bottom, so employees at all levels are contributing to the organization´s overall goals;
these goals become the standards for evaluation each employee´s performance.
A common method for goal setting. Objective: Remove ambiguities, reduce conflict. MBO attempts to align personal
goals with business strategy through increased communications and shared perceptions between managers and
subordinates. MBO may go beyond manager and subordinate roles to address individual, work groups and to reconcile
conflicts.
! Application stages:
 Get the entire group involved in the plan
 Set goals by manager and subordinate together
 Action plans are established by employees
 Discussing and agreeing on the criteria for success
 Track progress, review and readjusted periodically
 Records of meetings are maintained.

Sources of Performance information

360-degree feedback system Performance measurement that combines information from the employee´s managers,
peers, subordinates, self, and customers.
Benefits: Gathering multiple perspectives of performance
Benefits: Gathering multiple perspectives of performance, allowing the employees to compare their evaluation with
others. Formalizing communications between the employee and both internal and external customers.
Limitations (Potential demands placed on multiple raters, negative ramifications for raters; need for a facilitator to
interpret the results; companies’ failure to provide opportunities for employees to act on the information they receive.

Potential Errors in Performance Appraisal

! Contrast Errors. If the rater compares an individual, not against an objective standard, but against other
employees.
! Distributional Errors: when the raters tend to use only one part of a rating scale.
 Leniency: When a manager´s ratings are grouped at the positive end instead of being spread throughout the
performance scale.
 Strictness: When the rater favors lower rankings
 Central tendency: Tendency of a manager to rate most employees´ performance near the middle of the
performance scale.
! One opinion of a quality influences an opinion of an employee.
 Halo error: bias in the favorable direction
 Horns error: negative rankings
! Recency: Tendency of a manager to evaluate employees on work performed most recently – one or two months
prior to evaluation.

Employee Development (102 – 117)

Why is employee development important:
! It is necessary component of a company efforts to:
 Improve quality
 Retain key employees
 Talent management
 Mett the challenges of global competition and social change
 Incorporate technological advances and changes in work design.
! Development activities can help companies reduce turnover.
  By showing employees that the company is investing in the employees skill development.
 Nokia way: IIP (invest in people)
 Developing managers who can create a positive work environment that makes employees want to come to
work and contribute to the company goals.

Employee development refers to:

! Formal education
 assessments of personality and abilities
 Job experiences
! Interpersonal relationships in order to help employees perform effectively in their current or future job and
company.
 Mentoring
 Coaching

Formal Education:
! Formal education programs include:
 Off-site and on-site programs designed specifically for the company’s employees
 Content designed specifically to needs of the audience.
 Short coursed offered by consultants or universities
 Executive MBA programs
 Companies also provide tuition reimbursement to encourage employees
 Universities offering executive education programs are beginning to measure their programs ROI

Assessment of personality and abilities

Involves collecting information and
providing feedback to employees about their
behavior, communication style or skills.
Frequently used for: identify employees with
managerial potential
Measure current managers´ with potential
to move into higher-level executive positions
Work with teams to identify member´s
strength and weaknesses and factors that inhibit
productivity.
Three popular assessment tools:
Assessment center
Benchmarks
Performance appraisal and 360-degree
feedback systems

Job Experiences:
 Development occurs through job
experiences
 Major assumption is that development is
most likely to occur when there is a
mismatch between the employee´s skill and
past experiences and the skills required for
the job.
 Their skills must be stretched:
 Forced to learn new skills, apply them and knowledge in a new way and master new experiences.
Job rotation:

! Is used to develop skills as well as give employees experience needed for managerial positions.
! Linked with the career management process so employees know the development needs addressed by each job
assignment.
Job design technique that can be applied to employee development, it is to move emploiyees through a series of
job assignments in one or more functional areas.
Benefits Potential Problems
Helps employee understand the overall mission and May create short-term perspective on problems and
goals of the company. solutions
Understand how the various jobs and functions May not be given enough time in a position to receive a
contribute to achieving the goals of the company challenging assignment
Networking Satisfaction and motivation may be negatively affected
Enhances problem solving and decision making skills Productivity losses and work l9oad increases may occur
to both department involved.

Transfer: the organization assigns an employee to a position in a different area of the company. They don´t necessarily
increase job responsibilities or compensation. Downsides: it can create anxiety it is very hard to get employees to
accept them.
Downward move: occurs when an employee is given less responsibility and authority. Its may be a result of a poor
performance or for the need for the employee to develop their management skills.. Since most employees consider this
as a form of punishment.
Promotion: Assignment of an employee to a position with greater challenges, more responsibility and more authority
than in previous job, usually accompanied by a pay increase. Since they improve an employee´s pay status and feelings
of accomplishment, they are more willing to accept them.
Temporary Assignments with Other Organizations: In some cases, an employer might benefit from the skills an
employee can learn at another organization. There are 2 types of TAOO
Externship Full time temporary position at another organization. They are an attractive option for analytical positons, a
variation of this is to encourage skills-based volunteering.
Sabbatical: it’s a leave of absence form an organization to renew or develop skills. Employees in this period often
receive full pay and benefits. It lets them get away from the day to day stresses of their jobs and acquire new skills and
perspectives.

Interpersonal Relationships:
Employees can develop their skills and increase their knowledge about the organization and its customers by interacting
with a more experienced organization member. This interactions formally are 2 types used for employee development:
! Mentor: An experienced productive senior employee who helps a less experienced employee (a protégé). Most of
this relationships develop informally. This program can ensure that high-potential employees are matched with
wise, experienced mentors in key areas.
 Types:
 Formal: organizational sponsored and sanctioned.
 Informal: Voluntary, spontaneous, not managed or structured by the organization.
 Internal: Mentors employed outside of the organization
 Group mentoring: one mentor paired with 4 – 6 protegees, allowing proteges to learn from each
other as well as from the mentor, reduces the amount of mentors.
 Purposes:
 Socializing new employees
 Maximizing transfer of learning from training to the work setting
 Helping women and minorities gain experiences and exposure needed for managerial positions
 Sharing information
 Note:
 Purpose of the program is clearly understood
 Length of the program is specific
 Minimum level of contract between the mentor and protégé is specified.

! Coach: Is a peer or manager who works with an employee to motivate the employee, help him or her develop
skills, and provide reinforcement and feedback. It helps to improve by identifying areas for improvement and
setting goals. A coach has 3 primary roles:
 Working 1 on 1 with an employee as when giving feedback.
 Helping employees learn for themselves
 Providing resources such as mentors, courses or job experiences.

Training Development
Focus Current Future
Use of work experiences Low High
Goal Preparation for current job Preparation for changes
Participation Required Voluntary

Employee Career Management(118 -128)

«People experience changes in their needs, expectations, abilities, and behavior as they go through different stages of
their careers, the career stage is a critical individual characteristics that can explain difference in behavior and attitudes
among different people in organization.
! Career: individual sequence of attitudes and behavior associated with work-related experiences
and activities over the span of the person´s life.
Model of career development:
! Career development
 Process by which employees progress through a series of stages
 Important for companies to create and sustain a continuous learning environment.
! Biggest challenge companies face is how to balance advancing current employees career with simultaneously
attracting and acquiring employees with new skills.

Career Management
 Become aware of their own interests, values, strengths and weakness.
 Obtain information about job opportunities within the company
 Identify career goals
 Establish action plans to achieve career goals.

Negative side effects:

! Failure to motivate employees to plan their careers (Company perspective)
 Shortage of employees to fill open positions
 Lower employee commitment
 Inappropriate use of money allocated for training and development programs
! Lack of career management (Employee perspective)
 Frustration
 Feelings of not being valued
 Unable to find suitable employment should a job change be necessary due to mergers, acquisitions,
restructuring or downsizing.
 Use of information by employees to determine their careers interests, values, aptitudes
Step 1 and behavioral tendencies.
Involves psychological tests.
Self-
asses
ment

Information employees receive about how the compnay evaluates their skills and
Step 2 knowledge and where they fit into company plans
Realit
y
Check

Process of employees developing short and long term career objectives

Usually discussed with the manager and written into a development plan
Goals:
Step 3 Competencies Areas of improvement
Career goals Next assignments
Goal
settig Training and development needs.
n

Step 4 Employees determining how they will achieve their short and long term career goals.

Action
planni
ng
 Employe
Manager Company
e
Take the initiative to ask for Coaching: Providing employees
feedback from manangers
and peers regarding their Listening, probing problems with the resources
skill strenghts and and clarifying concerns they need to be
weaknesses. successful in their
career planning:
Identify their stage of career
development and Appraising Career workshops
development needs. Giving feedback, clarifying Information or access to
company standards and information on career
needs, and job and job oportunities
responsabilities. Career planing
Seek challenges by gaining workbooks and
exposure to a range of materials
learning opportunities
Advising: Career counseling
Generating options, Career paths
assisting in goal setting, The company must also
Interact with employees giving recomendations. monitor and evaluate
from different work groups the system and the
inside and outside the managers and
company
employees roles.
Referring
Linking to career resources,
Create visibility through follow up on career
good performance management plan.

Career and Human Resource planning

 Special Issues in Employee Development and Career Management
(129 – 134)
Dual-Career paths:
! Companies with professional employees, a key issue is how to ensure that they feel they are valued.
 Traditional career path model has limited advancement opportunities for those in technical career
path.
 Allows for the employee to remain on the technical path or to move into a managerial path.

Characteristics:
! Salary status and incentives for technical. Traditional career path model has limited advancement opportunities
for those in the technical career path.
! Individual contributor career path is not used to satisfy poor performers who have no managerial potential.
 Career path are for employees with outstanding technical skills.
! Individual contributors are given the opportunity to choose their career path
 Company provides assessment resources enables employees to make comparisons between their interests
and abilities with those of employees in technical and managerial positions.
Balancing work and life
! Helping employees balance work and life benefits the business and employees personal lives.
! Companies do not help their employees with their personal lives, they may leave for jobs with other companies in
other areas that do
! Supportive work life culture – a company culture that
 Acknowledges and respects family and life responsibilities and obligations.
 Encourages managers and employees to work together to meet personal and work needs.
! Family and Medical Leave act (FMLA)
 Allows up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave. With benefits required to be continued by the employer to care
for diverse medical or familiar reasosn.
Types of work-life conflict
! Roles that training can play in balancing work and non-work
 Time-based conflict when the demands of work and nonwork activities interfere with each other.
 Strain – Based conflict: due to the stress of work and nonwork roles
 Behavior-Based conflict: when employees behavior at work is not appropriate for their personal life and vice-
versa.