Wrong Design
Challenges associated with its design and implementation.
A lot can go wrong when the expected effectiveness of staff performance is not met. The main objective of the performance management system is usually to improve the overall performance of team members. Both management and employees work together to plot, monitor, evaluate, review, gauge the tasks undertaken by each team member all to contribute towards achieving an organization`s objectives.
With all these activities being carried out, challenges face the organizations and these include;
The performance management system and the tools to be used for appraisal must go hand in hand with the company`s needs. The system must be unique from any other organization`s organization. Consultation between the stakeholders and the users of the said system must occur. There should also be user trust for the system to be successful. The systems should be very fair to all, and all related documents should be in place. The said design should also have mechanisms that include reward programs for best performers and punishing or training the poor performers.
Support, as well as commitment from the management, is crucial for the implementation of any appraisal system. The management drives the process of implementing performance appraisal and making the entire process apart from the organization. The leaders measure performance through monitoring and gauging by use of already laid down strategic goals and objectives.
For the system to work effectively, it has to be integrated with the workforce, organizational goals and the culture of the organization in question.
- Assuming change management in the design and implementation of the system.
Strategic management relating to change is a crucial part of ensuring implementation of the system. The leaders of an organization create it to manage resistance. Communication is crucial in change management. The proper records must be in the right place, and all the implementation schedules must be followed.
All the employees must be competent enough to use the management system. They should also ensure proper implementation of the appraisal system.
The employees should be able to relate the KPI`s, give and receive feedback and be active listeners. There should be a performance coaching.
Performance management systems are systems designed by managers to ensure that employees achieve their tasks to the later efficiently and meet the organization’s objectives. The management of any organization or business tracks departmental or individual employee performance in line with meeting organizational goals.
If an organization needs to measure the effectiveness of performance management system, it needs to follow the five steps below;
- Undertake research as well as a benchmark on the most appropriate practice.
Inadequate Leadership Commitment
Organizations should focus on the best performance management tradition. This could be through reading through the latest researches done. Moreover, going through case studies that involve other companies that have achieved excellent performance management practice would also help.
- Have a clear set of goals relating to performance management.
The management should state its goals to be achieved through the use of performance management system so that the employees know what is required of them. The goals could be having an improved employee performance or organizational performance.
- Form success measures.
These indicate whether the goals for the performance measurement system have been achieved. For example, improved corporate performance would be indicated by more profits realized by the corporate.
This involves collecting both qualitative and quantitative data from the organization. It could be through surveys, conducting interviews or distributing questionnaires.
The management should know clearly about the effectiveness of the performance management processes to know where to improve if the outcome is not as good as the expectations.
- Know what you want to measure and how you will do it.
- Collect data for the measure.
- Let people and the systems analyze it.
- Briefly write and analyze the data to make it performance information.
- Communicate about the information to those whom it is made for, for them to make decisions.
- Interpret the information so that any implications to the business can be understood.
- Use the then resulting information to makes decisions on ways to improve performance.
This system helps employees perform their tasks effectively and efficiently. With this, the management can identify employee’s strengths as well as their weaknesses so that they become productive to the corporate.
The system is implemented in the following ways;
- Gauge the performance appraisal method currently in use.
As management, you should evaluate yourself by looking at how often you avail feedback to your employees as well as the kind of feedback. Define if there is a need for a change or not. The management can also decide to develop a new performance system or improve the one already in existence.
- Find corporate goals.
Corporate goals give the staff motivation to work towards achieving organizational goals altogether. Set annual goals for sales and even profits to be made and share them with every staff member.
- Fix performance expectations.
Share with you employees what you expect of them. Encourage them to do better. Point out any weaknesses that you may have noticed among them so that they change them for overall better performance. Give deadlines for any tasks.
- Monitor performance and give feedback.
Watch how the employees work and give credit when due. Where there are problems in completing tasks coach and train them.
- Gauge performance.
Rate the performance of each employee on whether they meet, not meet the expectations or exceed expectation. The provide feedback where you talk about rewarding or not rewarding the employee.
- Set new goals.
(b)Measurement approaches to performance management.
There are five major measurement approaches. These include;
- Comparative approach.
This is used to rank employees against each other. Best performers are promoted or awarded while poor performers can be either dismissed or given a chance to improve.
- Attribute approach.
Lack of Integration
The staff is rated on already set parameters like innovation, skills on how to solve problems, teamwork and creativity.
- Behavioral approach.
This relates to job dimensions. It involves Behaviorally Anchored Rating Scale (BARS) that consists of vertical scales and Behavioral Observation Scale (BOS).
- Result approach.
Staff performance results are used in this approach. The balanced scorecard model is used, and it uses financial, customer, innovation and growth and internal and operations perspectives as its matrix. The Productivity Measurement and Evaluation System is also used. It motivates employees for better productivity as well as to quantify feedback. This approach converts corporate strategies into corporate operations.
- Quality approach.
This approach focuses on ensuring best customer service and reduction of errors. The approach considers both staff or customer as well as the system.
(c)Correlation Between The Performance Management System And Entire Employee Development
Performance management systems are created to help employees grow and improve their talents and skills.
Employee development entails activities introduced by a company to help an employee develop. The activities include training the employees to acquire competences, provide employees with opportunities to realize their talents and guide poor performers to improve their performance.
Benefits of employee development include;
- Goals of a corporate organization can be met by availing facilities for employees to perform their tasks effectively.
- Grooming of leaders in the organization helps reduced costs of hiring new staff.
- Improved employee engagement when employees are happy and become an area of focus.
- Training of employees helps them become competent and undertake their responsibilities effectively.
- Performance Management System can be converted to employee development system by;
- Enabling the management to have feedback cycles often.
- The management should avail feedback to the employees, examine the status of objectives, listen carefully to the employee feedback and develop specific actions.
- The management should ensure that the feedback is available to all employees and the necessary actions are taken.
- Maintain the scorecard for each score to be used at the end of period performance appraisal.
Performance management system is used to perform appraisal annually, and much work is involved which stops when employee salary revisions are made. The systems also have limitations because it does not help the management notice training needs or staff development needs.
Once the feedback is obtained, it is used to address ways that can be used to improve employee performance hence it starts to convert to development management system. When the cycle has close intervals, the performance management system starts to become a development system, and that is how they are interrelated.
(d) Legal issues involved in performance management systems.
- The systems should not be biased in terms relating to sexual preference, marital status, age, gender or even disability.
- The records of any appraisal should be well kept by the company. For example, those of a poor performer will help handle his or her legal issues. Those employees who feel that their cases were not dealt with effectively may legitimately take legal actions against the employer.
- The appraisal system tool is used to improve employee performance not promote, increase an employees’ salary or demote anyone.
- The results of the system should be precise, supported by evidence and fair to all.
- The appraisals should not have emotive language.
- The results of the appraisal should be treated with confidentiality.
- Any employee should be allowed to give a remark about their evaluation result so that they can express their defense or agree to it.
(e) A performance management system.
(i) Individual performance.
To know if an employee is working towards improving company performance; both quantitative and qualitative metrics are used. These include;
Quantitative metrics Qualitative metrics
Number of defects Teamwork
Number of calls per hour Dependability
Number of customer calls per hour Initiative
Returns per hour Enthusiasm.
Sales per employee Communication
Profit contribution Creativity
Sales Empathy
The organization should connect the measures in the balanced scorecard with the most important organizational goals. The objectives should be measurable. The appraisals focus major on skills to complete tasks effectively and efficiently. They could be tools for monetary compensation.
(ii) Individual performance that contributes to team performance.
The metrics for measuring a team member contribution to a team include the following
Attendance
The other team members should check if a team member comes to work or not. Teams should automate time and those attending data. Those that don’t come to work are obviously not contributing to a team`s growth.
Helpfulness
This helps foster a certain culture among the team members like putting all your hands together to tackle a complicated task.
Initiative
Team members should take the initiative to ask about where they can help or take a step to do a certain task without having to be asked.
Efficiency
Everyone on the team should be able to complete their task on time. They should be able to use the limited resources effectively and efficiently. Team members should not need overtime to complete tasks allocated to them. They should meet deadlines.
Quality
Check how many connections a team member has as a sales person and are they important leads. If a team member is doing a quality job, then there will be increased sales.
(iii) Team performance
Organizations depend on teams of employees to complete some company tasks. The appraisals made assess how a team is working. In this case, no individual ratings are made. A team is composed of people with different attitudes and skills but with a common goal.
The following metrics are used to measure the performance of a team;
- Level of communication. Team members must cooperate with each other and put equal effort for a favorable result of their task.
- Overall outcome. Team tends to have different inputs into a process. In the outcome the different efforts for a successful must be realized.
- If the members of a team do not share feedback the, there is a likelihood of failure.
- Innovation level. People with different skills are put together to share ideas that will contribute in the total achievement of organizational goals.
References
Bart, S. (2000).What is Performance Management for you? The Performance Management Homepage, Retrieved from https://[email protected] accessed on 18th June 2010.
Bohlander, G. & Snell, S., 2010.Managing Human Resources, Mason: Cengage Learning.
Central Bank of Kenya (2009): Monthly Economic Review; January 2009 and May 2009
Gomes, J. & Romao, M., 2014.Advantages and limitations of performance measurement tools: The balanced scorecard. In 7th IADIS Information Systems 2014 Conference (IS 2014). Madrid: ISEG School of Economics and Management.
Martocchio, J., 2011.Strategic Compensation: A Human Resource Management Approach, Noida: Dorling Kindersley.
Noe, R., 2008. Human Resource Management, New Delhi: Tata McGraw-Hill Education.
Shout, A. & Yousif, M., 2014.Performance Evaluation Methods and Techniques Survey.International Journal of Computer and Information Technology, 3(5),pp.966-979.
Werther et al. (1986:230)
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