Human Resources

Lecture 10
Performance planning and review
Developing people and performance
 The Performance Appraisal Problem

-Negative Image. Employees do not like appraisals. And quite often appraisal are done
badly by managers who are not committed to a process or who are inadequately trained
and insufficiently prepared.
-Lack of Relevance. In many organisation, the emphasis is on judging past

performance not always against clear or agreed targets and reporting those judgments
to a third party. In these situations, neither managers nor employees see performance
appraisal as important to their roles and their contributions to the organisation.

Therefore, the performance planning and review are two processes that any
organisation can use to get over these problems described above.

Performance planning and review is one part of performance management.

Essentially, it is a process of planning an employee's future work goals and objectives,

reviewing job performance and work behaviours, assessing progress towards the
predetermined work goals, and discussing the employee’s training and development.
 According to Douglas McGregor (1957) there are three purposes of formal
performance appraisal plans.
-They provide systematic judgments to back up salary increases, promotions, transfers,

and sometimes demotions and terminations.

-They are a means of telling subordinates how they are doing, and suggesting needed

changes in behaviours, attitudes, skills or job knowledge, they let them know where
they stand with the boss.
-They are the basis for the coaching and councelling of the individual by the superior.

These days organisation use appraisals for:

-Setting work objectives;

-Providing feedback on performance results;

-Determining performance-based rewards;

-Identifying training needs;

-Helping with career and succession planning;

-Councelling employees;

-Making staffing decisions, including promotions and terminations.

 Dilemmas and conflicts.

Organisation Individuals

Seeing the development of Seeking valid

individuals through performance feedback
counselling, coaching and so they know where they
career planning stand and can develop.

Conflict Major Conflict

Conflict
Organisation Individuals
Seeking information from Seeking important
individuals on which to Major
rewards and
base rewards and make Conflict maintenance of self-
personnel decisions. image.

It is difficult for a manager to be both judge and helper. Therefore, it is not possible to
use appraisals for ANY purposes. They should be only selected purposes.
A performance review deals with the employee's performance against objectives over
the past twelve months, plans the employee’s goals for the next year and is part of the
remuneration process.

A personal development review examines the employee’s skills, knowledge and

abilities and identifies changes and improvements that would contribute to better job
performance.

Planning performance
Why set standards and objectives?
They are guidelines against which organisation and individual performance can be
assessed. They provide a factual basis for planning, managing and assessing
employees’ performance.

Introducing a goal that is difficult, but attainable, increases the challenge of the job. In
addition, a specific goal makes it clear to the worker what it is he is expected to do.
Goal feedback provides the worker with a sense of achievement, recognition and
accomplishment. He can see how well he is doing now as against his past performance
and, in some cases, how well he is doing in comparison with others. Thus the worker
not only may expend greater effort, but may also devise better creative tactics for
attaining the goal than those he previous used.
 Performance standards

Qualitative Quantitative

Performance indicators
A proactive role – to identify what should be done or accomplished.
A retrospective role – to provide criteria for determining success or failure.
Results-oriented indicators – which identify measurable performance and results,
including individual contributions as well as organisational results and
consequences.
Implementations – oriented indicators – which identify whether activities are faithful
to the organisation’s objectives and comply with its policies and procedures.

GOLS AND OBJECTIVES

S.M.A.R.T.
Specific Measurable Agreed Realistic Timeframaed
Reviewing performance
Performance reviews may be the most disliked and least adequately handled aspect of
the manager’s role.

To make reviews effective:

-Recognise that reviews are one part of a total process of improving performance;
Distinguish between performance, potential and salary reviews,
Concentrate on performance rather than personality;
Encourage participation;
Keep appraisal in the hands of management;
Insist on benefits.

Performance review techniques:

-Comparison methods;

-Standards-based reviews;

-Results-based reviews;

-Competency-based assessments.
MBO (Management By Objective) is the result-based review and it is not strictly a
method of performance review.

Other review methods

-Critical incidents (diary);

-Essays and narratives;

-Checklists;

-Peer reviews;

-Client reviews;

-Assessment centres;

Problems in performance review

- Lack of management commitment; Lack of training; No follow up or feedback;

Takes too much time; My job cannot be measured; Personalities have more
influence than performance; Priorities change and objectives become irrelevant.
 Errors in performance assessment
-Halo effect;
-Similarity and dissimilarity (rating because of some characteristic – e.g. age or

gender);
-Bias and prejudice (conscious and unconscious (age, race, gender, cultural origins,

appearance, marital status, social position and personal habits); judgments about an
employee’s personality traits which have no relevance to job performance, even of the
manager were qualified to make the judgments).
-Logical error – similar rating are given to factors which appear to be logically related,

but which are not.

The performance discussion

The interview may be an unpleasant experience for both supervisor and employee
unless it is skillfully conducted.
Communication skills – specific care should be taken to ensure that a performance
review discussion is an exchange of information .
Preparing to discuss performance
-Warm up

-Job responsibilities (let employee talk)

- What do you see as your major responsibilities at present?

- What are the priorities? Why?

-What would you change about your job?

-How could we better use your time and talents?

-Performance goals

-Job accomplishments;

-What has interested you most in your job in the past year?

-What have been the major accomplishments?

-Where do you think you are being most effective in your job?

-Areas of improvement.

-What disappoints or frustrates you most about your job at the present time?

-Where do you feel least effective?

-What can we do to help you increase your effectiveness?

-What help or support can I give you?

-Assessment
- Plans for improvement;

-Conclusion.

Managers should take care to be positive in their feedback and constructive in their
criticism.

Councelling. Problem-solving technique which uses one-to-one discussion to help

employee analyse and deal with work-related problems.

Directive councelling. Councellor discusses problem with employee, helps identify

causes and possible solutions, may suggest preferred courses of action, and shares in
employee’s decisions.

Non-directive councelling. Councellor has no option on what is best for employee, but
provides safe and confidential environment for employee to explore feeling and options
and reach a conclusion.
 Developing people and performance

Training programmes are concerned with a narrower range of job-related skills than
development programmes, which tend to emphasise the personal growth and potential
of individuals.

EDUCATION involved all those learning experiences which improve a person’s

general knowledge and overall competence. Its orientation is the person rather than the
job, although education will usually enhance an individual’s employment prospects. A
person’s education reflects the influence of parents, the programmes of the primary,
secondary and tertiary education systems, the news and entertainment media, social
relationships, personal study, individual aspiration, and so on.

TRAINING comprises learning activities which improve a person’s performance in a

particular occupation or job. It tens to be specific rather than general, and is usually
based on the skills, knowledge and attitudes required by an employer for satisfactory
performance of the job. Training will normally be provided by an employer on the job,
or with the employer’s support off the job, but may involve pre-employment study for
required vocational or professional qualifications.
DEVELOPMENT is the process of helping individuals to develop and fulfill their
potential. It includes education and training, but also involves counselling, performance
planning and review, and career discussions However, the traditional emphasis on
career development as promotion through the organisation is shifting as hierarchies
become flatter and the nature of careers changes. Individual and group competencies
are increasingly important aspects of staff development.

Why train and develop?

An organisation must choose whether to recruit from outside or develop and promote
from within.

For individuals, training and development activities are a means to improve their job
skills and knowledge, and this their performance, and to enhance their personal growth
and potential. Better performance brings greater job satisfaction, and can encourage
employees to accept new challenges and to cope with change.
For organisations, there are clear benefits in terms of better productivity; lower costs
in recruitment, materials wastage, absenteeism, lost time accidents and so on; a more
flexible and adaptable workforce, and more certain achievement of the organisation’s
goals and objectives.
 The learning process
Training and development should focus on learning, with the aim of ensuring that the
learner acquired and retains relevant new skills and knowledge, and is able to apply
them on the job.

Four levels of learning

-Knowing about

-Understanding

-Acceptance

-Ability to apply

Principles of learning
Keys to successful learning: motivation, knowing what to learn and why!
Organisations can raise the level of a person’s motivation to learn by providing:
-Intrinsic motivation – making the job or the training more interesting. The word

‘intrinsic’ refers to factors within the job or task itself - thus, an increase in intrinsic
motivation will be an outcome of job enrichment.
-Extrinsic motivation – which involves the rewards that the employee hopes to gain

from the learning experience. Extrinsic factors are those outside the content of the job
itself, and include increased remuneration, promotion or status changes, greater
employment security, and a sense of achievement from better performance.
 People learn at different rates, and learn different things at different rates.
People learn by doing.
Reinforcement and feedback are critical (rewards and punishment)
Whole learning is usually preferable to part learning.
Learning must be transferred from the training situation and applied on the job.

Adults as learners
Adults are self-directing
Adults have accumulated more experience
Adults’ readiness to learn is different
Adults are problem-centred

Learning styles
Activist;
Reflector;
Theorist;
Pragmatist.
Remember that:
-Older and younger people learn at different rates;

-People returning to the workforce may need to renew their learning habits;

-People may be put in training situations after many years with no experience of

education or learning;
-People with different educational backgrounds may have the same training needs but

will have very different learning needs, as will those whose first languages is not
English.

Responsibility for training and development might be allocated to managers:

-Corporate managers;

-Middle managers and line managers;

-Team leaders and supervisors;

-Training and development specialists.

The modern training and development specialist faces quite different challenges:
-The constant pressure of increasing business competition and the demand for greater

efficiency;
-The organisation’s need for more highly skilled people in a wider range of more

complex occupations and technologies;

-The frequent appearance of new concepts and techniques – e.g. the learning

organisation, competencies, intellectual capital, computer-based training and e-

learning;
-An unwillingness on the part of managers to ‘invest’ in training as a long-term strategy

for organisational improvement and development – instead, they often see it as an

optional ‘cost’ which is easily removed from budgets;
-Trends towards devolution and decentralisation, outsourcing, and the

‘democratisation’ of access to education and training through technology suck as the

internet;
-The repositioning of HR specialists as internal consultants or advisers to management.

Training activity must be securely linked to strategic objectives.

 Training delivery
-Exclusive internal structure;
-Exclusive external structure;
-Co-ordinated external structure;
-Eclectic structure.

The Learning Organisation

The rate at which organisations learn
may become the only sustainable
source of competitive advantage.
A learning organisation harnesses the full brainpower knowledge and experience
available to it, in order to evolve continually for the benefit of its stakeholders.

The ability to learn faster and deeper than your competitors may be the only
sustainable competitive advantage.
Characteristics of the learning organisation
-They solve problems systematically;

-Experiment with new approaches;

-Learn from their own experiences and history;

-Learn from the experiences and best practices of others;

-Transfer knowledge quickly and efficiently throughout the organisation.