CHAPTER 7: EVALUATING EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE Flashcards
the performance appraisal process
- Determine the purpose of a
- Identify environmental and cultural limitations
- Determine who will evaluate the performance
- Select the best appraisal methods to accomplish goals
- Train retainers
- Observe and document performance
- Evaluate Performance
- Communicate appraisal results to employees
- Make personnel decisions
- Monitor the legality and fairness of the appraisal process
A method of performance appraisal in which a supervisor is given several behaviors and is forced to choose which of them is most typical of the employee.
Forced-choice rating scale
Reason for Evaluating Employee Performance
Providing Employee Training and Feedback
Determining Salary Increases
Making Promotion Decisions
Making Termination Decisions
Conducting Personnel Research
A meeting between a supervisor and a subordinate for the purpose of discussing performance appraisal results.
Performance appraisal review
A performance appraisal system in which feedback is obtained from multiple sources such as supervisors, subordinates, and peers.
360-degree feedback
A performance appraisal strategy in which an employee receives feedback from sources (e.g., clients, subordinates, peers) other than just his or her supervisor.
Multiple-source feedback
the most common source of performance appraisal
Supervisors
come from employees who work directly with an employee. they see the actual behavior
Peers
also called upward feedback
Subordinate feedback
provide feedback on employee performance byfiling complaints or complimenting a manager about one of her employees
Customers
Allowing an employee to evaluate her own behavior and performance
Self-Appraisal
Prior to developing the actual performance appraisal instrument, two important decisions must be made, which are?
the focus of the performance appraisal dimensions and whether to use rankings or ratings.
Four Ways to Focus Performance Dimensions
Competency focus (Skills)
Task Focus
Goal Focus
Trait Focus
concentrates on such employee attributes as dependability, honesty, and courtesy.
Trait-Focused Performance Dimensions
concentrate on the employee’s knowledge, skills, and abilities
Competency-Focused Performance Dimensions
organized by the similarity of tasks that are performed
Task-Focused Performance Dimensions
to organize the appraisal on the basis of goals to be accomplished by the employee
Goal-Focused Performance Dimensions
the effort an employee makes to get along with peers, improve the organization, and perform tasks that are needed but are not necessarily an official part of the employee’s job description.
contextual performance
A method of performance appraisal in which employees are ranked from best to worst.
Rank order
A form of ranking in which a group of employees to be ranked are compared one pair at a time.
Paired comparison
A performance appraisal method in which a predetermined percentage of employees are placed into a number of performance categories.
Also called “rank and yank,”
Forced distribution method
Common types of objective measures include
quantity of work, quality of work, attendance, and safety.
A type of objective criterion used to measure job performance by counting the number of relevant job behaviors that occur.
Quantity
A type of objective criterion used to measure job performance by comparing a job behavior with a standard.
Quality
Deviation from a standard of quality; also a type of response to communication overload that involves processing all information but processing some of it incorrectly
Error
A common method for objectively measuring one aspect of an employee’s performance is
Attendance
A method of performance appraisal that involves rating employee performance on an interval or ratio scale.
Graphic rating scale
consist of a list of behaviors, expectations, or results for each dimension. This list is used to force the supervisor to concentrate on the relevant behaviors that fall under a dimension.
behavioral checklists
The condition in which a criterion score is affected by things other than those under the control of the employee.
Contamination
A method of training raters in which the rater is provided with job-related information, a chance to practice ratings, examples of ratings made by experts, and the rationale behind the expert ratings.
Frame-of-reference training
method of performance appraisal in which the supervisor records employee behaviors that were observed on the job and rates the employee on the basis of that record.
examples of excellent and poor employee performance.
Critical incidents
A standardized use of the critical-incident technique developed at General Motors.
Employee Performance Record
Rating errors in which a rater will use only a certain part of a rating scale when evaluating employee performance.
Distribution errors
A type of rating error in which a rater consistently gives all employees high ratings, regardless of their actual levels of performance
Leniency error
A type of rating error in which a rater consistently rates all employees in the middle of the scale, regardless of their actual levels of performance
Central tendency error
A type of rating error in which a rater consistently gives all employees low ratings, regardless of their actual levels of performance.
Strictness error
occurs when a rater allows either a single attribute or an overall impression of an individual to affect the ratings that she makes on each relevant job dimension.
For example, a teacher might think that a student is highly creative. Because of that, the teacher might rate the student as being intelligent and industrious when, in fact, the student’s grades are below average.
halo error
occur when a rating made on one dimension affects the rating made on the dimension that immediately follows it on the rating scale.
Proximity errors
A type of rating error in which raters base their rating of an employee during one rating period on the ratings the rater gave during a previous period.
Assimilation
The idea that supervisors do not see most of an employee’s behavior.
Infrequent observation
Prior to the Interview
allocate time
Schedule the interview
Prepare for the interview
Once the employee and supervisor are feeling as comfortable as they are going to get, the supervisor should communicate the following:
(1) the role of performance appraisal—that making decisions about salary increases and terminations is not its only purpose;
(2) how the performance appraisal was conducted;
(3) how the evaluation process was accomplished;
(4) the expectation that the appraisal interview will be interactive; and
(5) the goal of understanding and improving performance.
to attribute others’ failure or poor performance to personal rather than situational factors.
fundamental attribution error
The opinion of courts in most states that employers have the right to hire and fire an employee at will and without any specific cause.
Employment-at-will doctrine
Statements in employment applications and company manuals reaffirming an organization’s right to hire and fire at will.
Employment-at-will statements
Legal reasons for terminating employees
Probationary Period
Violation of Company Rules
Inability to Perform
Reduction in Force (Layoff)
Providing employees with punishments of increasing severity, as needed, in order to change behavior.
Progressive discipline
