What is the motive or the theory behind Performance Appraisal? VIII (Performance Assessment)

View the last(seventh) part of this post : What is the motive or the theory behind Performance Appraisal? VII (New Method of Goal Achievement)

            

Now we are done with the Goal Setting Exercise quite elaborately. I invite your comments on how you can benefit from these informations in your professional and personal life. 

However, now we will move ahead to the next step in the Performance Appraisal System i.e. Performance Assessment or Performance Evaluation.

Before going ahead with my discussion on this process elaborately, I would like to introduce you all to the different tools of Performance Appraisal that have been categorized according to the Assessment Method.

First of all we will discuss the Traditional Methods in practice. They can be named and described as following:-

1. ESSAY APPRAISAL METHOD This traditional form of appraisal, also known as "Free Form method" involves a description of the performance of an employee by his superior. The description is an evaluation of the performance of any individual based on the facts and often includes examples and evidences to support the information. A major drawback of the method is the inseparability of the bias of the evaluator.

2. STRAIGHT RANKING METHOD This is one of the oldest and simplest techniques of performance appraisal. In this method, the appraiser ranks the employees from the best to the poorest on the basis of their overall performance. It is quite useful for a comparative evaluation. 

3. PAIRED COMPARISON A better technique of comparison than the straight ranking method, this method compares each employee with all others in the group, one at a time. After all the comparisons on the basis of the overall comparisons, the employees are given the final rankings.

4. CRITICAL INCIDENTS METHODS In this method of Performance appraisal, the evaluator rates the employee on the basis of critical events and how the employee behaved during those incidents. It includes both negative and positive points. The drawback of this method is that the supervisor has to note down the critical incidents and the employee behaviour as and when they occur.

5. FIELD REVIEW In this method, a senior member of the HR department or a training officer discusses and interviews the supervisors to evaluate and rate their respective subordinates. A major drawback of this method is that it is a very time consuming method. But this method helps to reduce the superiors’ personal bias.

6. CHECKLIST METHOD The rater is given a checklist of the descriptions of the behaviour of the employees on job. The checklist contains a list of statements on the basis of which the rater describes the on the job performance of the employees.

7. GRAPHIC RATING SCALE In this method, an employee’s quality and quantity of work is assessed in a graphic scale indicating different degrees of a particular trait. The factors taken into consideration include both the personal characteristics and characteristics related to the on the job performance of the employees. For example a trait like Job Knowledge may be judged on the range of average, above average, outstanding or unsatisfactory.

8. FORCED DISTRIBUTION To eliminate the element of bias from the rater’s ratings, the evaluator is asked to distribute the employees in some fixed categories of ratings like on a normal distribution curve. The rater chooses the appropriate fit for the categories on his own discretion.

15% high performance                          

20% High average performance

30% average performance

20% low average performance

15% low performance

Now listed out below are the Modern Methods. They can be named and described as follows:-

ASSESSMENT CENTRES -

An assessment centre typically involves the use of methods like social/informal events, tests and exercises, assignments being given to a group of employees to assess their competencies to take higher responsibilities in the future. Generally, employees are given an assignment similar to the job they would be expected to perform if promoted. The trained evaluators observe and evaluate employees as they perform the assigned jobs and are evaluated on job related characteristics.

The major competencies that are judged in assessment centres are interpersonal skills, intellectual capability, planning and organizing capabilities, motivation, career orientation etc. assessment centres are also an effective way to determine the training and development needs of the targeted employees.

BEHAVIORALLY ANCHORED RATING SCALES

Behaviourally Anchored Rating Scales (BARS) is a relatively new technique which combines the graphic rating scale and critical incidents method. It consists of predetermined critical areas of job performance or sets of behavioural statements describing important job performance qualities as good or bad (for eg. the qualities like inter personal relationships, adaptability and reliability, job knowledge etc). These statements are developed from critical incidents.

In this method, an employee’s actual job behaviour is judged against the desired behaviour by recording and comparing the behaviour with BARS. Developing and practicing BARS requires expert knowledge.

HUMAN RESOURCE ACCOUNTING METHOD

Human resources are valuable assets for every organization. Human resource accounting method tries to find the relative worth of these assets in the terms of money. In this method the Performance appraisal of the employees is judged in terms of cost and contribution of the employees. The cost of employees include all the expenses incurred on them like their compensation, recruitment and selection costs, induction and training costs etc whereas their contribution includes the total value added (in monetary terms). The difference between the cost and the contribution will be the performance of the employees. Ideally, the contribution of the employees should be greater than the cost incurred on them.

MANAGEMENT BY OBJECTIVE METHOD

The concept of ‘Management by Objectives’ (MBO) was first given by Peter Drucker in 1954. It can be defined as a process whereby the employees and the superiors come together to identify common goals, the employees set their goals to be achieved, the standards to be taken as the criteria for measurement of their performance and contribution and deciding the course of action to be followed.

The essence of MBO is participative goal setting, choosing course of actions and decision making. An important part of the MBO is the measurement and the comparison of the employee’s actual performance with the standards set. Ideally, when employees themselves have been involved with the goal setting and the choosing the course of action to be followed by them, they are more likely to fulfil their responsibilities.

THE MBO PROCESS

UNIQUE FEATURES AND ADVANTAGES OF MBO

The principle behind Management by Objectives (MBO) is to create empowered employees who have clarity of the roles and responsibilities expected from them, understand their objectives to be achieved and thus help in the achievement of organizational as well as personal goals.

Some of the important features and advantages of MBO are:

• Clarity of goals – With MBO, came the concept of SMART goals i.e. goals that are:
  
  Specific
  Measurable
  Achievable
  Realistic, and
  Time bound.
  
  The goals thus set are clear, motivating and there is a linkage between organizational goals and performance targets of the employees.

• The focus is on future rather than on past. Goals and standards are set for the performance for the future with periodic reviews and feedback.

• Motivation – Involving employees in the whole process of goal setting and increasing employee empowerment increases employee job satisfaction and commitment.

• Better communication and Coordination – Frequent reviews and interactions between superiors and subordinates helps to maintain harmonious relationships within the enterprise and also solve many problems faced during the period.

360 DEGREE FEEDBACK

360 degree feedback, also known as 'multi-rater feedback', is the most comprehensive appraisal where the feedback about the employees’ performance comes from all the sources that come in contact with the employee on his job.

360 degree respondents for an employee can be his/her peers, managers (i.e. superior), subordinates, team members, customers, suppliers/ vendors - anyone who comes into contact with the employee and can provide valuable insights and information or feedback regarding the "on-the-job" performance of the employee.

360 degree appraisal has four integral components:

1. Self appraisal
2. Superior’s appraisal
3. Subordinate’s appraisal
4. Peer appraisal.

Self appraisal gives a chance to the employee to look at his/her strengths and weaknesses, his achievements, and judge his own performance. Superior’s appraisal forms the traditional part of the 360 degree performance appraisal where the employees’ responsibilities and actual performance is rated by the superior.

Subordinates appraisal gives a chance to judge the employee on the parameters like communication and motivating abilities, superior’s ability to delegate the work, leadership qualities etc. Also known as internal customers, the correct feedback given by peers can help to find employees’ abilities to work in a team, co-operation and sensitivity towards others.
Self assessment is an indispensable part of 360 degree appraisals and therefore 360 degree Performance appraisal have high employee involvement and also have the strongest impact on behavior and performance. It provides a "360-degree review" of the employees’ performance and is considered to be one of the most credible performance appraisal methods.

360 degree performance appraisal is also a powerful developmental tool because when conducted at regular intervals (say yearly) it helps to keep a track of the changes others’ perceptions about the employees. A 360 degree appraisal is generally found more suitable for the managers as it helps to assess their leadership and managing styles. This technique is being effectively used across the globe for performance appraisals. Some of the organizations following it are Wipro, Infosys, and Reliance Industries etc.

Arguments Against 360 Degree Performance Appraisal

Despite the fact that 360 degree appraisals are being widely used throughout the world for appraising the performance of the employees at all levels, many HR experts and professionals argument against using the technique of 360 degree appraisals. The main arguments are:

• 360 performance rating system is not a validated or corroborated technique for Performance appraisal.
• With the increase in the number of raters from one to five (commonly), it become difficult to separate, calculate and eliminate personal biasness and differences.
• It is often time consuming and difficult to analyze the information gathered.
• The results can be manipulated by the employees towards their desired ratings with the help of the raters.
• The 360 degree appraisal mechanism can have a adversely effect the motivation and the performance of the employees.

• 360 degree feedback – as a process requires commitment of top management and the HR, resources(time, financial resources etc), planned implementation and follow up.
• 360 degree feedback can be adversely affected by the customers perception of the organisation and their incomplete knowledge about the process and the clarity of the process.
• Often, the process suffers because of the lack of knowledge on the part of the participants or the raters.

After going through all these methods you must have got the idea as to which one of the method we are following and which is the best optimum method to follow. 

Actually speaking no method is full proof in itself and all have its advantages and disadvantages but the cache here is that why not study, review and pick the best from each method and come up with our own method which suits us and our organizational setup and above all the stars in this process the EMPLOYEES.

So in the next post we will thoroughly discuss the Performance Review or Assessment as it goes.

The Art of Interviewing

The Art of Interviewing

What picture comes to your mind when I say “Interview”? Two people, sitting across the table with one’s hands on his/her lap with a generally erect posture sitting on the edge of the seat and the other with a more forward and relaxed posture with his/her hand resting on the table. This is the picture that comes to my mind. What does your mind outline on your imaginative canvas? Maybe you'll remember the worst or in few cases best of your interviews ever or may be your last interview.  

We all have got jitters about interviews at any point of our career and would have gone through volumes on “How to be successful in interviews?” and endless sessions with our seniors and peers on what all to keep in mind while attending an interview. But does anybody think about Interviewing? I guess nobody or a very selected few. Why? Because you don’t lose anything evident while interviewing. Yes, you have got the hint. I am not going to talk about the entity i.e. the interviewee which most discuss under the heading of Interview.

Here we will talk about the other entity in the picture I have described above; the one that is more relaxed with his/her hands on the table with a forward posture. 

Before going ahead I will put forward certain questions for your thinking process to set off in the direction we are moving ahead. They are:-

1. Generally how many interviews on an average do we attend or get rejected to before we are finally selected? 
2. Have you been able to decipher the exact reason/s for your rejection/s?
3. Do you have any idea as to how many resumes are shuffled through, how many are short listings and how many various levels of interviews a company conducts for a single position?
4. Do you know how big the cost involved in the process of recruitment is?

I would like you to give answers to all the above questions to your own self according to your own understanding and experience of the subject. A few more pondering questions to follow the answers to the above questions:-

1.      Have you given a thought to the fact that for the same skill set and similar positions how many different feelings you get after say n numbers of interviews?

1.  Compare this with the n number of written tests given by you with the same level of preparation.
2.  How many times you have felt that your interview went just fine and you were not selected and vice versa i.e. like you didn’t perform at all and you were selected?

What do we decipher from the above brainstorming? 

Yes, the biggest influential factor on which the outcome of this exercise interview depends is the entity – Interviewer. 

Before discussing over the Art of Interviewing we need to understand what the purpose of an interview is. We will see various definitions of Interview.

The Dictionary meaning of Interview is:-

A formal meeting in person, especially one arranged for the assessment of the qualifications of an applicant.

1. A conversation, such as one conducted by a reporter, in which facts or statements are elicited from another.
2. An account or a reproduction of such a conversation.

The Business definition of Interview is:-

A somewhat formal discussion between two parties in which information is exchanged. For a business looking to fill an open job position, an employee might interview potential candidates to gain a better understanding of their backgrounds, qualifications and skills.

Now, I think we have a clear and agreed upon understanding of the purpose of this exercise called Interview. To elaborate it further I would like to state that it is a process of assessment of potential candidates on the basis of given facts i.e. the job description of the open position and the written Resume of the candidate.

Hope everybody agrees upon my statement as well.  I have kept it confined to the business purpose only. There can be interviews for various other purposes also like for example a reporter interviewing a celebrity. But, on second thoughts, is it really different.

Can we give it a thought and see how different is the Interview taken by a reporter to the interview taken by an employer? Let’s compare it columnar form.

                                                    Interview

Reporter	Employer
Interviewee is a celebrity	Interviewee is a common man
Interviewer wants to have a news to sell	Interviewee is here to take up job for living.
Interviewer has done a thorough research	Interviewee has done the Research here
Interviewer has to extract maximum info	Interviewee is concerned give out the max
Interviewer is fully prepared	Interviewee is prepared here

I have refrained myself on the preparedness of the employer in the above comparison. There can be a few more points to compare the difference or the relatedness of both types of interview. But, I think these points are enough to let your mind wander on the same paradigm as mine is. It will be easier for me to make you understand my view point. 

Now, again reviewing the above comparisons, the only interpretation that I can make out is that only the entity who is to gain the maximum from this exercise is different i.e. the reporter in the first and the interviewee in the second. Otherwise, the sole purpose of the process is same i.e. to extract maximum information on a certain context from the interviewee in question.

I will take my leave here with a note to all my readers to retrospect all the interviews you have been a part of either as an interviewer or an interviewee and we will discuss it further in the next post. 

ENJOY THE VIDEO

A view on the Customer Apathy.

I stumbled upon this article in a national newspaper while on a boring train trip and thought of sharing it with my readers. The writer is the CEO of Equus Red Cell.

This is my favorite topic and, in the same breath, my per piss-off point. My two insurance agents are like Santa Claus. They come visiting once a year when they have to collect their premium cheques. Through the year, they are nowhere to be seen.

They know i am alive purely because a claim hasn’t been made. They have no idea about what’s going on in my life. Worse still, they have scant knowledge about my kids or wife. As a result, they have lost business that they could have got had they not waited for their annual sleighs to be delivered to their doorsteps. 

Banks are worse. Typically, and you can check this out, any branch manager of a bank makes two calls a day. One to address a customer crib. And the other to cross-sell a product. Hawk like all they do is keep an eye on your balance and the moment they see a bob of extra cash in the pot, they come armed with another investment option. Besides that, not a single call to ask whether you are well or whether they can be of any use.

I have often wondered about the origin of this customer apathy. More so, given the fact that you have oodles of your customers’ money in your coffers.

There are other categories that are equally tardy. Real Estate. Have you ever got a call from your builder after you have bought home?

Increasingly, blokes like the ones in insurance companies and banks must understand that having a relationship manager and having a relationship are two matters. They have to come to terms with the fact  that the data that they acquire when they opened your account or commenced a “relationship” is about 20 years old and needs some dusting and spring cleaning.

My banker doesn’t even know the ages of my children. How cool is that?

So what really is the point one wishes to make? The fact that all brands are relationships. They require constant conversations, the odd seduction, the little surprises and some TLC.

Had they not made the entire process of changing your number into a thesis in astrophysics, number portability can be an excellent example of how customers will be ruthless with those who don’t care.

Indeed, in my estimation, the time has come to understand a defining moment in consumerism. 

Customer care can no longer be a division in a company. Customer care is the brand on offer.

How does it sound? The guy is really pissed off with the whole business of customer care, and he is somewhat true. In his piss off he has really shown the way to our relationship managers and customer cares the key to the heart of the customer and in turn the master of the business that can be generated from there.

My personal opinion differs in the case of my insurance agents. I was blessed with two very fine insurance agents and they were the people who were in constant touch with me and still are after 5 years even though I am not giving them any sort of further business. The benefit – the moment I or any of my friends had to invest they were the first people who got the business. And one of them even was awarded on an all India Level in his company. 

Yes, it’s true that customer care of a product or service is now a brand to offer and it really affects even the first hand sale. 

Even, what happens when we receive a call for certain product or service from a customer care division. We are pissed off and either we cut the phone, say sorry or fool around with the caller. Is it not true that each one of us may need any of these products or service at any stage in life? And when the time comes, who is there to grab that opportunity?

What is the motive or the theory behind Performance Appraisal? VII (New Method of Goal Achievement)

What is the motive or theory behind Performace Appraisal? VI   Click for the Previous Post on Goal Achievement

                A NEW METHOD FOR GOAL SETTING

Most people have heard of the SMART method of goal setting. This is an acronym for Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Time-line. It provides a basic formula on how to construct goals and how to go about achieving them. SMART is a useful tool however I’ve never been overly fond of it. I feel it limits people in believing what they could achieve; people set so-called “realistic” goals only to be disappointed. The goals they set are too easy to attain or are not very inspiring so they don’t have the passion necessary to drive them forward.

I believe you should set goals that initially may intimidate you. They should move you out of your comfort zone. They should stir up feelings within you that make you to look at how you approach life and how you view the world and yourself.

It’s been said that if you continue to do what you’ve always done, you’ll continue to get what you’ve got. So if you desire a different outcome you will need to do things differently. Big goals by their very nature require you to do things differently. Dreaming big stirs up passion within you so you can use this feeling to make the necessary changes in yourself to achieve your goals.

Now don’t get me wrong. I’m not advocating wishful thinking here. Hoping to achieve something without changing yourself is wishing. Wanting to achieve a goal by opening yourself to the required changes is purposeful goal setting.

In our “instant gratification” culture we seem to have forgotten that some goals will take a certain time to reach, especially when it comes to health and fitness. Our body systems need time to adapt to changes. Peter Druker, a top business guru, said, “People overestimate what they can accomplish in one year but underestimate what they can accomplish in five years.”

It may take some time but EVERYONE is capable of achieving their dreams if we allow ourselves to believe strongly enough and are open to taking the necessary steps. So don’t be afraid of setting BIG goals for yourself.

With this in mind, their is new method developed which I feel is a more passionate and dynamic method to goal setting. It's called the INSPIRE Method and I’ll outline each of the steps below.

                                                                 INSPIRE

INSPIRE Yourself to Reach Your Goals

 

I – Identify clearly what you want. A favourite quote of mine is “If you don’t know where it is you’re going, you’ll never get there.” People often don’t achieve goals because they don’t know what they want. One of the best ways to clearly identify what you want is to write it down. By the very act of writing down your goals you increase your chances of success. Did you know that only 3% of people actually take the time to write out their goals? No wonder a vast majority of people “fail” to achieve success. They have no idea

what success looks like for them! When writing out your goals focus on what you want in the positive. Let’s use weight loss as an example. Don’t’ say I want to lose five pounds, say I AM 140 lbs. For achieving a good level of fitness and health say I AM fit, healthy and powerful. Don’t worry about the how yet, simply and clearly state what you want to achieve.

N – Nurture your desires. Use your emotions to align yourself with your goals. You can use various techniques to help you capture the energy of your emotions to propel you toward your goals. One technique is visualization. Spend a few minutes every day sitting in a quite environment where you can picture your goal. Experience the feeling of having reached your goal NOW. Be very vivid with your imagination; the more senses you can involve the better. Sights, smells, sounds, touch – use any or all of these senses to create a real life image of your goal achieved. Using the example of weight loss again (this seems to be a popular goal for

any people in January), picture what your body will feel like at your desired weight. How will your clothes fit? How does it feel to have more energy? Or perhaps you’ve been living with back pain or knee pain. How does it feel to not have the pain? How does it feel to move easily and without restriction? Harness these feelings to drive you. Your body doesn’t know the difference from an imagined event to a “real” event. Research on top athletes has shown they activate the same muscles in the same patterns when visualizing as they do when they actually perform their event. Using the power of your mind can set up the right physiology in your body to achieve your fitness goals. By believing first we will then see the results.

S – Support yourself. Ask anyone who has achieved anything and they will tell you they had help along the way. What’s the first thing award winners do at award shows? They pull out their thank you list of people who helped them achieve their goal. Seek friends, family, professionals, books, and groups; whatever it is that can help you. This is one of the main reasons why people hire fitness coaches. We give them advice and support to achieve their fitness and health goals. Marathon runners almost always train in groups. While the event is an individual sport, the group support gets the runners through the weeks and months of tough training

they need to finish a marathon. We all need help and that help is always available if we allow our selves to receive it.

P – Plan. This is where you work on the “how”. Things like scheduling, what tools we’ll use, how often we’ll workout, deadline for your goal, etc. Using the example of a marathon, you pick a date for your race, you plan how often and when you’ll run, what days you’ll do your long run, how you’ll structure your training period and so on. Another often used quote is “Failing to plan is planning to fail.” This is so true. Not planning is another key reason people fail to achieve goals. It is during this stage where you can break down a big goal into bite-sized chunks and divide it into smaller goals. Olympic athletes spend four years preparing for an event. During those years they have qualifying events that push them forward to the ultimate event. Process goals are very important in the planning stage. What I mean by process goal is the purpose of the goal isn’t dependent on the outcome but rather the focus is on the “doing”. Let’s say your ultimate goal is to lose 40 lbs. This is an outcome goal, you know where or not you’ve succeeded by looking at the scale. Success is measured by the outcome. To achieve this goal you know you need to watch what you eat and exercise. So you devise a plan where you’ll exercise four times a week and eat at regular times each day. These are process goals. Success isn’t determined by some outcome but rather by the actual “doing” – the process of working out four times per week and eating balanced meals at regular intervals.

I – Initiate action. You’ve set yourself a big goal, you’ve harnessed your emotions to drive you and you’ve come up with a plan. The next step is to take a step each day towards your goal. As the ancient Chinese proverb says, “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” Do not judge your actions; there are no big or small steps. Only steps. What might seem like a “small” step now could turn out to be huge later on. Some days the action might be to just rewrite your goals or to use your visualization technique to motivate yourself again. Let’s go back to the weight loss example. Action could entail strenuous physical activity as in working out or it could be calling around to find a good fitness coach to help you design the most effective program for you.

R – Release your goal. Set your goal but do not hang onto to it too tightly. If we get too caught up on the goal it can become an anchor. I know this may sound confusing. Up to this point I’ve been telling you to focus

on your goals, write them out, visualize them, get out of your comfort zone and now I’m apparently telling you to forget them? Well in a way, I am. Let me explain. Did you ever really want something, I mean really, really want something but no matter how hard you tried you just couldn’t get it? And were there times when you tried something you really didn’t care much about and you got it right away? What happened? The pressure we put on ourselves to do something overwhelms us and undermines our success. You need just the right amount of pressure to move you out of you comfort zone but not enough to break you. Sometimes the pressure of wanting is too much. Besides would you rather want to be fit or just to be fit? Often we need only to allow ourselves to achieve our goal and then get out of our own way. 

E – Evaluate/evolve/enjoy. Check back periodically to see how you’re doing. Are you doing all the process goals you need to? Are you still passionate about your goal? You may decide your goal isn’t something you really wanted to pursue and choose a more appropriate goal. Or you may achieve it. Either way you’ll be happier for it. 

Let me give you an example of a friend of mine who was out of job during recession.  He continuously tried  for various jobs for months but failed. Ultimately, he decided to start his own work and started working on it and got positive results but at the back of his mind he was still not satisfied.  The fact that he had been rejected in all the last appeared interviews kept haunting him because it was unacceptable for him. He decided to continue with the job interviews and set a goal to be successful and satisfied with his next 5 interviews. He laid out his plan, executed and was selected in 4 of the interviews but joined none.(released the goal) The result? He is still pursuing his own start up. And he's not disappointed in himself at all. but more confident and successful. You see he came to realize that he was not satisfied with his limitations job or his work life. He’d rather put double effort in starting up his own work. Giving further interviews was a goal only for his ego. Remember, the point of all this is to enjoy the ride. Working towards your goals should bring you happiness and fulfillment. Sure there might be some difficult moments during the process but it should not feel like a prison term. Even if its tough work you should feel joy most of the time as you move towards your goal. The more you do, the sooner you will reach your goal.

Make 2011 a Breakthrough Year!

Use the INSPIRE process to set and reach your goals in 2011. Don’t wait, get a head start on the New Year and start today. Think about some things that you’d truly like to achieve. Don’t worry if you don’t have it all figured out right now. If your goals scare you a little, that’s okay. Go through the steps and see what happens. If you follow each of the steps and take the time to do them correctly I’m certain you’ll be pleased with the results.

Have a breakthrough year in 2011!

"It's a funny thing about life. If you refuse to accept anything but the best, you

very often get it." Somerset Maugham