What is the purpose of performance management?
- To enhance employee motivation and productivity
- To support the achviement of the organisation’s strategic goals
- To facilitate strategic planning and change
What is the process of performance management and what do the stages entail?
- Performance Criteria & Measures
- Established by managers, sometimes in consultation with employees
- Performance Criteria & Measures
- Performance Appraisal
- Evaluation of performance over the review period
- Performance Appraisal
- Performance Review
- A formal dialogue/exchange between employee and supervisor about the employee’s performance over the review period for the purpose of reaching agreement about what had been achieved, what can be improved, and how such improvements can be achieved
- Performance Review
How is validity and reliability applied in the performance management?
- Correct standards
- Standards applied consistently
- Judgement based on evidence and critical incidents related to standards
What are the elements of procedural and interpersonal fairness in performance management?
- Validity & Reliability
- Fair Hearing (or ‘voice’)
- Adequate Notice
What is fair hearing?
- aka voice
- Have employees provided input to assessment process e.g. self assessment
- Opportunity to explain
- Right to refute and appeal
What are the components of adequate notice in performance management?
- Explaining performance standards in advence
- Early and ongoing notice of areas of under-performance
- Opportunity to improve
What are the approaches to performance management?
- Evaluative
* Developmental
What is the evaluative approach to performance management?
- Measuring performance
- Rewarding performance
- Promotion
- Demotion
- Monitoring the effectiveness of other HRM politics and practices (i.e. predictive validity)
What is the developmental approach to performance management?
- Providing formal feedback on performance
- Maintaining and improving motivation
- Career development
- Identifityin obstacles to improved performance
- Assessing HR planning
What are the key steps in performance reviews?
- Evaluate performance
- Feedback on performance
- Provide positive reinforcement
- Exchange of views about what has been adhered and what needs to be done
- Agreement about what needs to be done next
What are the important decisions about when to do performance reviews?
- Frequency
- Timing
- In relation to pay review
What are the options for frequency of performance reviews?
- Annually (formal)
- Half-yearly
- Quarterly (informal)
What are the options for timing of performance reviews?
- Simultaneously (e.g link in with annual HR planning cycle)
- Staggered
What are the options for relation to pay review of performance reviews?
- Simultaneously
- Subsequently (e.g. 3-6 month lag before pay outcome announced)
What is the preparation to be done prior to performance reviews?
- Job Description/Relevant Standards
- Achieved standards and objectives since last review?
- Factors that affected performance: direct & external
- Implemented last development plan?
- Feedback to provide + evidence
- Possible actions by employee to improve performance
- Sufficient guidance given? More needed?
- Possible changes to enhance use of skills and abilities?
- Ready for additional responsibilities?
- Benefit from being reassigned?
- Best direction for employee’s career?
- What additional development needed?
What barriers prevent people benefiting from negative feedback?
- Most people don’t like giving it
- Most people do not want it because of perceived loss of face
- Typically perceived less accurately than positive feedback because mechanisms aimed at protecting self esteem distort message
- Self-serving bias: undesirable outcomes blamed on contextual facts rather than on the individual
- Denial, especially by individuals with high self esteem, history of high performance, and over-exposure to positive feedback
- individuals with low self-esteem may experience further loss of self-image
What is performance counselling?
- What managers do when they help under-performers
What are the requirements for acceptance of negative feedback?
- Perception of provider credibility, trustworthiness and goodwill
- High ‘elaboration’ i.e. recipient actively scrutinises feedback validity and reliability
- High ‘self efficacy’ i.e. ‘I can do something positive about this’
What are the steps in the performance counselling process?
- Understand the perspective of the other person
- Recognise and agree on the existence, nature and extent of the problem
- Reframe the perspective from negative to positive. Discussing the issues to help change perspectives and indicate possible solutions
- Empower the employee to recognise the problem, propose solutions and take action to implements the solution
- Plan remedial action - The individual decides to take action and the manager formulates an action plan, provides expertise and guidance to facilitate the individual desired goals
- Resource the employee adequately so they can address the problems
What are the do’s of performance counselling?
- Provide specific examples of critical incidents
- Keep to valid and agreed perofrmacen criteria
- Offer constructive suggestions/solutions
- invite the employee to produce own ideas on remedial action
- Agree on an action plan
What are the don’ts of performance counselling?
- Downplay the positives
- ‘Play the person’
- Violate interactional justice perceptions (i.e. treat the recieptinet with dignity and respect)
- Deal with more than one or two weaknesses in one meeting
What is coaching?
- A one-on-one learning process to help high performers further enhance performance
- The purpose is to examine areas for development and to assist the coachee in thinking through work related problems and identifying and evaluation possible responses
- The coach helps establish development plans and, if the relationship continues, can track accomplishments in carrying out the plan
- The coach is not the ‘teacher’ (nor mentor) and does not necessarily need to possess a detailed knowledge of the job or role
- Coach is thee to help coachee ‘learn how to learn’
- Involves day to day discussion of personal attitudes, outlook, emotions, work relsitnahip and personal development strategies
What are the performance review styles?
- Tell and Sell
- Tell and Listen
- Problem-solving
What is the ‘Tell and Sell’ Style?
- tell employee of performance
- Obtain employee acceptance of evaluation
- Persuade employee to agree to supervisors plan for improvement
