performance management process essay

Essay on Performance Management Process

Through performance management, management and workers collaborate to organize, evaluate, and analyze an employee’s job objectives and contributions to the corporation. Performance management is a continual process of creating targets, measuring progress, and offering continuing feedback and coaching to ensure that workers fulfill their objectives and career goals. Armstrong and Baron (1998) consider it a never-ending process that prioritizes the future over the organization’s past. They stress the strategic and holistic character of the process, which aims to improve the efficacy of firms by enhancing the efficiency of the employees and by expanding the capacities of individuals and team contributors. The main goals of performance management are to communicate a common goal of the firm’s mission, define expectations of the firm, and ensure that the employees understand what high performance means and how to accomplish it. Also, it helps increase worker motivation and allows them to track their progress and determine what should be done to enhance overall performance. The process is more than just an annual performance review. The steps to the process can be broken down into four, including; planning, coaching, reviewing, and rewarding.

While planning, HR must describe the position in detail, including the short- and long-term goals, primary aims, detailed descriptions, and an explicit criterion for evaluating these goals and objectives. The goals should be detailed, quantifiable, attainable, and exact performance requirements should be established. Personnel has an opportunity to provide feedback on the information after managers have completed the defining step (Qureshi et al., 2010). They execute their jobs; therefore, they have a unique perspective on the skills, abilities, and goals that can best help the corporation accomplish its objectives. Both administration and the personnel agree on the role’s description, purpose, and aims. By making the first step of the process collaborative, the management set the tone for the rest of the process to be interactive. Personnel feels participated in goal setting, which is critical.

At the beginning of the process, it is critical to go over performance objectives with personnel, covering both results and behavior they are intended to accomplish during the next cycle. Behaviors are significant because they indicate how employees approach their work, support the team, mentor, and communicate to others (Pulakos, 2014). Some employees produce excellent results, but it is challenging to deal with, unfriendly, and demonstrate maladaptive work behaviors. Behavior is vital to consider in the work environment; such behaviors can be pretty disruptive. On the other hand, a worker can be interpersonally practical, kind, and exceedingly helpful but never achieve significant outcomes.

Coaching is a necessary process and should be done regularly. Employees are coached to solve performance challenges and problems to make an excellent contribution to the corporation. Monitoring performances do not include scrutinizing details of how employees do their allocated duties and activities. During couching, there is an examination of how far the employees have a cone in achieving their goals. Potential roadblocks to the staff’s performance goals and what might be done to overcome them are identified. Thoughts are made on how the team achieves its objectives (Qureshi et al., 2010). Adjustments to the work schedule are determined due to shifts in the corporation’s priorities or when staff is required to take on new duties. The management determines whether more assistance is necessary to help the employee in accomplishing their goals. Setting objectives for specific employees is an integral part of performance management and requires a successful performance evaluation. Thus, there is a need to track how far the employee has progressed towards their objectives. Also, it is important to note how they attained their goals. The idea is to measure frequently and apply the results to coaching and counseling.

A review or appraisal meeting is a chance to examine, analyze, and highlight the employee’s achievements during the appraisal period. Most appraisals include a self-examination component. Workers can analyze their performance in advance of the appraisal meeting by utilizing the performance plan and evaluation form as a guide. The procedure can aid in the identification of discrepancies between the employee’s self-perception and the manager’s perspectives and promote a more in-depth discussion of performance difficulties. To properly analyze employee performance, the manager should evaluate their performance management notes and other documentation collected during the year issues communicated to the employee before the assessment should be included in the record and meeting. Thus, ensuring that the management address performance problems while developing and assuring the employees that the performance evaluation meeting will be free of surprises (Qureshi et al., 2010). A successful review system should include all critical parts of the job, be devoid of contaminating influences, and quantify essential job attributes. It should be trustworthy and free of rating flaws. Equally important, review systems should be fair to everyone as they must meet the criteria of equality legislation.

Recognition and reward are the last steps in the process, and it helps employees stay motivated such as leadership opportunities, time-off, recognition, and new projects. Workers should be motivated by a good incentive and recognition system that aligns their objectives with the company. Staff remuneration and recognition for good performance must maximize competitiveness and yielding pay investment in such a framework. Given the high expense of reward programs, it is critical to have a well-thought-out strategy that reflects their goals and expectations. The significant functions of incentive programs are attracting and retaining qualified people, particularly in tight labor markets, driving workers to fulfill their job aims and impacting the culture, reinforcing and defining the structure like status and hierarchy, and encouraging entrepreneurship, flexibility, participation, and innovation. The end of the performance cycle provides the last opportunity for the employees and the management to give feedback on the process and input and feedback for the first stage for the next cycle.

Performance engagement aids in the development of a culture of support and trust among employees and the business. Workers are more engaged when they are aware that their efforts are recognized and appreciated. Staff who receive feedback from their employers once a year, for instance, will be detached and disengaged (Brown et al., 2018). Performance management can also be helpful when building employee development strategies, indicating that one is anticipating employee development requirements thus, boosting the overall performance.

An aging population has two significant HR impacts in terms of the management process. First, the management can ensure the delivery of knowledge held by the older workers before they retire; second, firms have to address how to maintain reliable levels of efficiency among older workers even as they remain in the firm. As the personnel that drive the knowledge-based economy ages, there seems to be a risk that critical expertise will be lost as the older workers go to retirement (Beardwell & Thompson, 2017). Therefore, knowledge transfer ensures a firm’s success, and knowledge is recognized as the most significant business resource. A performance management process is a deliberate approach for providing the appropriate information to the right individuals at the right time and a method for placing knowledge into practice to enhance corporation performance.

Understanding how diversity influences performance has become a preeminent problem for HRM as the workers continue to be more diversified and inclusive. The impact of diverse populations on workplace results has been investigated. Job satisfaction is favorably and strongly connected to diversity management. Well-managed diversity management leads to a more satisfied workforce. It implies that resources should be allocated to diversity management initiatives and training programs at the corporate level (Beardwell & Thompson, 2017). All personnel, especially supervisors, should consider diversity as a fundamental asset. At the sub-organizational level, the management interested in successful performance management should devote time and effort to comprehending the various views of staff groups. Acknowledging and handling diversity present in teams will lead to the success of the organization. Therefore, HR teams must consider diversity management as a primary instrument in the toolset of performance management. They must endeavor to provide diversity-related competencies and elevate levels of awareness and understanding throughout the company.

In conclusion, human resources are significant to a company’s success. Corporations would be unproductive if they did not have efficient personnel, and they would risk missing to carry out their stated objectives and goals. As a result, every company, as part of its strategy, implements appropriate processes of performance management, a system that aids in the commitment of staff members to the company’s goals. If personnel realize that their effort and devotion are being reviewed, they will be more motivated to continue working. To encourage the growth of remuneration or other forms of incentives like praise and appreciation, as an element related to assessment and plays a vital role in engaging workers. Thus, many multinational businesses use remuneration due to good performance in the company structure (Osmani & Ramolli), 2012). The performance review process is perceived as more formal and should be completed by the management. Still, in most instances, the evaluation of the people is done without assessing the actual capabilities and outcomes of staff performance. While the technique of remuneration is used, it all remains a matter of choice as the evaluation is variable depending on narrow political or personal interests as determined by the management or business leaders. In addition, a component that should be present in performance evaluations is a greater emphasis on the discovery and use of strategies for enhancing performance instead of their application with no beneficial consequences.

Beardwell, J., & Thompson, A. (2017).  Human resource management: a contemporary approach.  (8th ed.). Pearson.

Brown, T. C., O’Kane, P., Mazumdar, B., & McCracken, M. (2018). Performance Management: A Scoping Review of the Literature and an Agenda for Future Research.  Human Resource Development Review ,  18 (1), 47–82. https://doi.org/10.1177/1534484318798533

Osmani, F., & Ramolli), G. M. (2012). Performance Management, Its Assessment and Importance.  Procedia – Social and Behavioral Sciences ,  41 , 434–441. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2012.04.052

Pulakos, E. (2014).  Performance Management A roadmap for developing, implementing and evaluating performance management systems . https://www.shrm.org/hr-today/trends-and-forecasting/special-reports-and-expert-views/Documents/Performance-Management.pdf

Qureshi, J., Shahjehan, A., & Afsar, B. (2010). Performance management systems: A comparative analysis.  African Journal of Business Management ,  4 (9), 1856–1862. https://academicjournals.org/journal/AJBM/article-full-text-pdf/0ECF0F532323.pdf

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Performance Management

Using real-world examples and best practises, uncover what performance management is and why it is important.

Ivan Andreev

Demand Generation & Capture Strategist, Valamis

March 14, 2022 · updated July 31, 2024

17 minute read

Increasingly, organizations are understanding that their management systems must be brought into the 21st century if they are going to be competitive in the current market.

Research shows that previous systems, such as yearly appraisals, are outdated and can even serve to decrease employee engagement and motivation. In light of this, more companies are turning to performance management than ever before.

This dynamic and strategic approach to developing improved performance in employees is gaining ground in companies large and small, including many Fortune 500 and industry-leading organizations.

What is performance management?

The importance of performance management, the purpose and goals of performance management, the benefits of performance management, 15 employee performance management best practices, 5 real-world examples of performance management, what is the difference between performance management and performance appraisals.

Performance management is a strategic approach to creating and sustaining improved performance in employees, leading to an increase in the effectiveness of companies.

By focusing on the development of employees and the alignment of company goals with team and individual goals, managers can create a work environment that enables both employees and companies to thrive.

Based on the definition of performance management, a system is built within an organization to measure and improve the performance of the people in that organization.

In practice, performance management means that management is consistently working to develop their employees, establish clear goals, and offer consistent feedback throughout the year.

In contrast to other systems of reviewing employee performance, such as yearly performance appraisals , employee performance management is a much more dynamic and involved process with better outcomes.

For the Human Resources department, performance management is an important system for onboarding , developing and retaining employees, as well as reviewing their performance.

It is increasingly understood that a yearly performance appraisal system does not effectively engage employees, fails to consistently set and meet company objectives, and does not result in a strong understanding of employee performance.

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Why is performance management important?

In any organization, no matter the size, it is important to understand what your employees are doing, how they are doing it, and why they are doing it.

Without a system in place to define roles, understand individual strengths and weaknesses, provide constructive feedback , trigger interventions and reward positive behavior, it is much more difficult for managers to effectively lead their employees.

Smart organizations pair their performance management with an incentive management process. The two systems have a lot in common, from defining roles and setting goals to reviewing and rewarding employee behavior, and as such, do very well when run simultaneously. Using incentive management also means that the all-important ‘reward’ step of performance management is done properly.

Talent management is an important part of every organization. Three of the main problems that organizations face are:

• keeping employees engaged
• retaining talent
• developing leaders from within

These are the issues that performance management very effectively targets.

1. Keeping employees engaged

Engagement of employees is a focus of any management team. In a yearly appraisal system, goals would be given at the beginning of the year and then revisited 12 months later to see if they had been met. This long stretch of time without feedback or check-in is an almost certain engagement killer.

In fact, 94% of employees would prefer their manager gives them feedback and development opportunities in real-time, and 81% would prefer at least quarterly check-ins with their manager, according to the Growth Divide Study .

Studies show that employees do best with feedback on a monthly or quarterly basis, with regular check-ins serving as a zone to problem solve, adjust goals as necessary, and to refresh their focus on the goal. In fact, companies where employees meet to review goals quarterly or more frequently are almost 50% more likely to have above-average financial performance.

When surveyed, employees had some negative feelings about a yearly appraisal system:

• 62% of employees feel that their performance review was incomplete
• 48% did not feel comfortable raising issues with their manager in between performance reviews
• 61% feel that the process is outdated
• 74% feel that they would be more effective with more frequent feedback
• 68% of executives don’t learn about employee concerns until the performance review

All of this adds up to a lot of missed opportunities to solve problems and increase employee performance and engagement.

As employee engagement rises, nine key performance indicators show successful outcomes. Absenteeism, turnover, shrinkage, safety incidents, patient safety incidents and defects in quality are lessened by at least 25%, and often more, across the board. Customer experience, productivity and profitability all show positive outcomes.

This study, by Gallup , was conducted across a broad range of industries, showing that employee engagement is a critical factor, no matter the industry.

2. Retaining talent

Employees who have frequent meetings with management to discuss performance, solve problems and receive training are more likely to stay with the company.

If employees see that their management team is putting in the work to develop them professionally, help them succeed with their goals, and reward performance on a consistent basis, then they are more incentivized to both stay with the company and work harder.

3. Developing leaders from within

This consistent development and partnership between managers and employees allow for the development of leaders from within the company.

Recruiting costs can be extremely high, as are costs for onboarding and training new employees. To be able to groom leaders from within the company means that there is already a proven culture fit with this individual and that training costs and resources spent developing this person into an asset are not lost.

This leadership path also serves as a motivating force for employees, who can see that their hard work will be rewarded with promotions and other benefits.

Performance management also creates a need for management to consistently focus on company objectives and goals, and to consider how best to achieve them. This continual revisiting of goals means that they are more likely to stay relevant, as goals will be adjusted in light of new technology, changes in the market, or other factors throughout the year.

According to Forbes , ‘companies that set performance goals quarterly generate 31% greater returns from their performance process than those who do it annually, and those who do it monthly get even better results.’

The purpose of performance management is to give both managers and employees a clear and consistent system within which to work that, in turn, will lead to increased productivity.

• This system shows employees the pathway to success, allows for the measuring of performance coupled with feedback and offers training and development opportunities.
• Performance management allows management to understand what their employees are doing and track progress on company objectives while providing consistent feedback.

There are five main objectives of performance management:

• Develop clear role definitions, expectations and goals
• Increase employee engagement
• Develop managerial leadership and coaching skills
• Boost productivity through improved performance
• Develop a performance reward program that incentivizes accomplishment

These performance management goals show a clear path from the developing of goals to the rewarding of increased accomplishment. If one of these performance management objectives is not done well, then the others will suffer as a result.

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Performance management has a multitude of benefits for employees and managers, as well as for the company as a whole. If a company can successfully create an environment of engagement where customers are equally engaged by employees on the front line, their outcome is even better.

When organizations successfully engage their customers and their employees, they experience a 240% boost in performance-related business outcomes compared with an organization with neither engaged employees nor engaged customers. – Gallup

• Having well-defined roles and performance standards makes hiring an easier process, as candidates know what is expected of them, and HR can more easily understand if a candidate is a right fit for the role.
• Those well-defined roles and standards make training easier, as trainers know exactly which areas need to be covered, and which information is nonessential.
• Consistent developing and revisiting of goals ensure that the organization keeps up with changing market forces easily, and reacts quickly as a whole, regardless of the size of the organization.
• Clear expectations and roles set employees up for achieving goals from the start, providing a springboard to success.
• Employees who feel that their company is invested in their success stay with their companies, increasing employee retention.
• Consistent feedback and coaching from managers lead directly to increased engagement from employees while developing the ability to provide good coaching and feedback leads to more skilled managers.
• As employees become more skilled, they can move up through the company, creating a leadership pipeline.
• Productivity will increase thanks to increased engagement, clear goals and upskilling of employees.
• Employees remain incentivized to perform long-term, as they are properly rewarded for their hard work.

While performance management can sound deceptively simple, with just four steps as outlined above, the process itself is very complicated. That’s why we have put together this list of best practices for performance management.

Think of it like the essentials of performance management – these will help make sure that your employee performance management system is performing the way it should.

1. Identify the goals of your performance management initiatives

As you are creating your performance management program, you need to understand what you want to accomplish.

Asking the following questions can help you:

• Is increased productivity a priority?
• Does your organization want to identify leaders from within and develop them?
• Do you want to streamline the compensation process?
• Are you seeking to improve employee retention or engagement?

If you know what you want your program to do, it will be easier to build it to accomplish that goal.

2. Define and describe each role

We mentioned this above, but it bears repeating. It is much harder for an employee to be successful if they don’t know exactly what is expected from them, how they should do it, and what the end result should look like.

3. Pair goals with a performance plan

As you set goals, develop a performance plan to go alongside. Year-long goals often fail, as they are too large and employees can get overwhelmed before they start. A performance plan helps them visualize their path, making it much more likely that they will meet their goal.

4. Monitor progress towards performance targets

Review key areas of performance. Use metrics and analytics to your advantage, tracking how goals are progressing to make sure that interventions can happen early, if necessary.

5. Coaching should be frequent

The point of coaching is to help identify and solve problems before they get too big. If it’s not frequent, it’s not going to help at all. Monthly or quarterly meetings should be held to help keep employees on the right track.

6. Use guidelines to your advantage

Guidelines should be created for each role as part of the first stage of the performance management cycle. These policies or guidelines should stipulate specific areas for, or limits on, opportunity, search and experimentation. Employees do their jobs better when they have solid guidelines to follow.

7. Build a performance-aligned culture

Make sure your workplace has shared values and cultural alignment. A sense of shared values, beliefs and expectations among employees creates a more harmonious and pleasant workplace. Employees should be committed to the values and objectives outlined, and exemplified by, top management.

8. Organize cross-functional workshops

This helps employees – and managers – understand what other departments do, how they think and what their strengths and weaknesses are. They can discover something new and find new connections, which can help them in future work.

9. Management should offer actionable feedback

During these coaching meetings, tensions can arise if the feedback is not given in a constructive, actionable manner. It is not very important to look backward and point fingers, rather management should guide employees towards future success.

10. Keep it professional, not personal

Giving less-than-stellar feedback is hard on both managers and employees, it’s one of the reasons that performance appraisals tend to be a least-liked task. Managers should make sure to keep feedback professional and remember to focus on behavior, rather than characteristics.

For example, pointing out that David regularly turned in important reports late is feedback about a behavior. Saying that David is lazy, and that’s why the reports were often late is feedback about a characteristic. One of these can help an employee own their role in a project’s success (or lack thereof) and the other will make them defensive instantly.

11. It’s not only employees that need training

Management should be trained too. Coaching and offering good feedback are not easy jobs, which is why there are so many specialist coaches out there. For managers to be able to lead well, they should be trained in these skill sets.

12. Take advantage of multiple-source feedback

Ask employees to write feedback for each other. This will give management a more holistic view on employee performance, understand the challenges that teams are facing, and be able to better offer feedback.

13. Don’t depend only on reviews

While the review process is important, it is only one part of the system as a whole. Planning, coaching, and rewarding employees are equally key parts of the system.

14. Problems are not always employee-based

It can be easy to assume that problems are always caused by employees, but that simply is not the case. Problems can arise from external factors such as availability of supplies, internal processes that are causing issues, or organizational policies. Seek out the source of problems as precisely as you can in order to fix them.

15. Recognize and reward performance publicly and frequently

Management cannot expect employees to stay motivated if they are never rewarded, yet many companies overlook this key step. Make sure that employees are compensated and recognized for their hard work, and they will continue delivering for your organization.

Of course, it’s one thing to understand the theory of what performance management is, but it’s another thing to use it in a real company. Let’s take a look at some real-world examples of the performance management process in action:

It’s no surprise that Google would show up on a list of companies that use a newer, innovative system of management. This company has always been a trendsetter, and their performance management process is one that relies on data and analysis, as well as making sure that their managers are well trained.

When assessing their performance management system, Google launched a project dedicated to assessing their managers, which has led to a thorough training and future development process that sets managers, and thus employees, up for success.

They also use a system of setting goals that have caught on across multiple industries. Using their Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) system, they reframe the goal-setting process, with great results.

Another tech trendsetter, Facebook has a performance management process that puts a heavy emphasis on peer-to-peer feedback. In semi-annual reviews, they are able to use that feedback to see how well teams are performing and understand where collaboration is happening – and where it is not. They also have developed an internal software to provide continuous, real-time feedback. This helps employees solve issues before they become problems.

Cargill is a Minnesota-based food-producer and distributor with over 150,000 employees and serves to demonstrate that even huge companies can ditch unwieldy performance appraisals and institute a new system. In following the latest research on the dissatisfaction of management with outdated performance management process, Cargill created their ‘Everyday Performance Management’ system. The system is designed to be continuous, centered around a positive employee-manager relationship, with daily activity and feedback being incorporated into conversations that solve problems rather than rehash past actions.

The Everyday Performance Management system had overwhelmingly positive results, with 69% of employees stating that they received feedback that was useful for their professional development, and 70% reporting that they felt valued as a result of the continuous performance discussions with their manager.

Adobe calculated that managers were spending about 80,000 hours a year on performance reviews, only to have employees report that they left those reviews demoralized and turnover was increasing as a result.

Seeing a system that only produced negatives, Adobe’s leadership team made a bold leap into a performance management system that began by training managers how to perform more frequent check-ins and offer actionable guidance, then the company gave managers the leeway they needed to effectively lead.

Management was given much more freedom in how they structured their check-ins and employee review sessions, as well as more discretion in salaries and promotions. Employees are often contacted for ‘pulse surveys’ – a way for the leadership team to make sure that individual managers are leading their teams well. One of the many positive results of this has been a 30% cut involuntary turnover due to a frequent check-in program.

Accenture is a massive company – over 330,000 people, so changing their systems means a huge effort. When they switched to their new system, they got rid of about 90% of the previous process. Now, they are using a more fluid performance management process where employees receive ongoing, timely feedback from management. This has been paired with a renewed focus on immediate employee development and an internal app for communicating feedback.

There are common threads in all of these examples. Each company has built a system that works for them, rather than following a one-size-fits-all approach. What works for one company might not work for another – it depends on the industry, the speed and flexibility of the company, and the overall goal of the system itself.

With similar names and purposes that sometimes align, it is no surprise that some people find it hard to spot the difference between performance management and performance appraisals.

In fact, performance appraisals are often part of the performance management process , although some companies still rely on performance appraisals alone.

An easy way to understand the difference between the two is that performance appraisals are reactive, and performance management is proactive.

A performance appraisal looks at all of the past actions of the employee within a set amount of time , and rates how well they performed in their role and how many goals they met.

Performance management looks at the present and future of the employee, and what can be done to help future performance and meet future goals . Performance management is focused on the development and training of an employee, and how that can benefit both the employee and the company.

A performance appraisal is a formal, operational task, done according to rigid parameters and in a quantitative manner. HR leads performance appraisals, with input from management. Performance management is much more informal and strategic, led by management with input from the employees in a more flexible manner.

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Performance Management: A Systematic Review of the Literature and an Agenda for Future Research

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Employee Performance in Management Essay

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Introduction

Role definition and profiling, setting the performance benchmarks, steps involved in performance management, dealing with underperformance, employee development, involvement of employees in strategic planning, recommendations, works cited.

The management of employee or the human resource is very instrument towards success in terms of performance. Proper management makes the employees be motivated and feel that they are working in a friendly environment.

The performance management is affected by different factors that surround the employee. These range from social, economical and even work related reasons.

The organization is supposed to reduce to the least attainable levels the factors that may affect an employee in order to realize the full potential of the same. A cliché goes “a happy employee makes a happy boss”.

The concept of performance management seeks to improve the general efficacy and the efficiency of human resource. An efficient and proper system of performance management can be used for several purposes.

These include communication of the organization goals, gauging the performance of the organization as well as giving feedback as to how to improve the current existing performance.

Performance management is defined as: “a process used for establishing a shared understanding of what is to be achieved, and the approach to managing and also developing people in such a manner which increases the probability that it shall be achieved in the desired short and long term” (Armstrong & Baron 19).

From the definition, it is self evident that performance management is a key process in any organization. It plays an important in determining how fast an organization will grow. It is also important to the employee as it makes him be aware of his strengths and development during his career.

It is not a single process. Neither is it a technique. It’s a comprehensive set of process combined with philosophies that seek to determine the factors that can improve the performance of an employee and the way which these will be employed (Aslam 3).

This means that performance management involves a deeper understanding of the employee and the factors surrounding his ability to perform a certain duty as well as coming up with a solution to remove these hindrances and develop an efficient employee.

In order to ensure that the full potential of employee is achieved, step must be taken to ensure that performance is attained. The steps begin before the work is actually carried out and it continues even after the completion of the work.

In pre planning, there are role setting and objective determination while in post work there is the employee appraisal (feedback) and the overall review of the employee performance. The steps involved generally include role definition, performance benchmarking, performance development and performance review.

The first step in performance management is understanding the role and niche that the organization seeks to fill. In understanding this, the company then goes ahead and profiles.

Here the managers sit and define the purpose of the organization as well as the priority of each. It is also during this step that the managers shall set the objectives of the organization and the purposes that the same shall seek to fulfil.

The managers also clearly define the roles of the organization in accordance with the core values of the organization. The role is normally on tandem with what the objectives of the organization are.

It is comprehensive enough to include the mission and vision of the group. These are important as they set an overview of how an employee shall be expected to carry out his duties during the tenure of his employment.

They also provide a general idea of how an employee shall conduct himself during the performance.

In setting the performance benchmarks, there is need to understand the objectives and the goals that the organization seeks to achieve. In this stage the managers shall sit down and define the organizational objectives as well as how these objectives shall be achieved.

In order to measure performance, there should be benchmarks against which the performance shall be measured against. The managers shall also determine the suitable management model that shall be applicable to the organization.

There are different forms of management. It is therefore upon the managers to carefully interrogate these models and come up with one that fits the nature of performance that is desired by the organization.

The first important step that the line managers take is to have a meeting and set the objectives as well as the strategies. Performance management shall be aimed at attaining a certain objective.

The sales manager shall have the objective of ensuring that the sales in a particular business increase by at least twenty percent. The strategic planning manager shall give his target objective and the strategy to ensure that that particular objective is attained.

In setting the objectives, the managers are required to be realistic. The managers are supposed to take a REAL (Realistic, Efficient, Acceptable and Long lasting) approach.

An unrealistic plan or objective is likely to stress the employees and consequently reduce the input of the same. Furthermore, having unrealistic goals can end up demoralizing the management as failure is likely to occur.

The objectives themselves are supposed to be SMART (Aslam 6). SMART is an acronym for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time framed. These are the core considerations that an organization shall bear in mind when deciding on the objectives.

The second step involves brainstorming and coming up with how to achieve the objectives set in step one. In this step, the managers have to consider the different roles each department plays and employ relevant and corresponding tactics that will work out.

One of the methods that shall be employed is the use of self managed teams. The rationale behind this is that the employees in such a group have a sense of independence and also have team work bonding.

The self managed groups, unlike the directed groups, are normally innovative, take initiative and own the organization goals (Elmuti 235).

The third step involves competence assessment. Here the managers shall be involved in matching the employees to the duties that correspond with their skills.

Competency also means assessing whether the organization’s human resource has the required know-how people to carry out the means set in step to achieve the objectives set in the first step. Competence assessment shall ensure that no employee is given a duty which beyond his capability.

Assigning an employee a duty that is beyond his capability imposes stress and pressure and consequently reduces the performance.

After the competence assessment is complete then the managers can now embark on duty allocation. Incompetence assessment the manager should look at the holistic strengths and weaknesses of an employee.

They should also consider factors such as experience and leadership skill of the same. Any mistake made in the allocation of the duties to the employees shall extend and contribute towards the performance of such an employee. Proper allocation of duties is likely to deliver better performance.

Also worthy of note is that poor allocation of duties leads to waste of talent on the part of the employee and poor delivery to the organization. Staffing is therefore very important in increasing employee performance.

Execution is the next step. During execution of a plan, there is need for constant monitoring and evaluation of how the employees are fairing. This is important in order to make sure that any mistakes are immediately corrected before they go deep into affecting the whole plan.

The monitoring should take place at all levels and should be both horizontal as well as vertical. There should be a proper communication channel during the execution. The channel should be both upwards and downwards.

The upward communication channel allows the employees to communicate the challenges they are facing. It is axiomatic that these challenges have an impact on their final performance.

Downward communication is important to let the employees know whether they are performing a good job or not. Communication has a bearing on the performance of an employee and it is also a great instrument for passing the goals and targets of the organization.

Lastly there is the process of performance evaluation. It is during this process that performance rating and grading. While rating and grading performance it is important to bear in mind the benchmarks, objectives as well as the goals that the organization sought to achieve in the first place.

Performance evaluation and rating is the basis for performance review. In order to do a proper review, you need to compare your current grading to your former grading. It is also during the performance review that an organization can trace and find out where or what influenced poor performance in a certain organization department.

From here, the managers shall then communicate the feedback and performance appraisal to the employees. Feedback to the employees is good for two main purposes.

Worthy of note is that in an organization there are three levels of goals. There are the employee’s individual goals, the team or group goals and finally the overall organization goals.

Good management need to delve into what the employees’ individual goals are. In order to motivate the employees in achieving the target company goals there is a need to synchronize employee goals with the overall goals.

Sometimes within a team, ones individual performance appraisal can have the impact of interfering with the intended group goals and targets. This is mainly through emphasizing the individual (Wiese & Buckley 234).

It is axiomatic that individual performance differs from one employee to another. What is important is that all the employees give their best and at least manage to attain the minimum target.

In order to motivate the underperforming employees the company shall offer rewards and promotions to the performing employees. This will serve as an enticing gesture towards working hard. It will also motivate the workers.

There is a connection between performance at work and the social life of an employee. The organization shall allow the employees to have a social welfare group.

This shall be in charge of advocating and promoting the social welfare of the employees. An employee who is socially relaxed performs better than one who is disturbed.

Another way of dealing with underperforming employees is to try and develop them in terms of expertise and technical ability. This can be done through sponsoring them to formal education.

This can be done through sending them to seminars or even providing them with loans (at a lower interest rate) to further their education.

Setting semi-autonomous work groups are also helpful in terms of improving employee’s capability. When in teams it is easier for an underperforming employee to learn from others. However, important to note is that this shall depend on the level of bonding between the members.

It is thus important for an organization to ensure that there is enough bonding sessions so that the employees can acquaint themselves to each other. Also during boning session, an employee who is seen as underperforming can have the chance to showcase his strengths.

These strengths can be useful in other departments. As a result his underperformance in one department shall lead to his transfer to a department in which he has strengths and thereby improving his performance.

It is important that an employee develops and not just stagnate in terms of his expertise. Development is important as the employee increases his know-how in both technical and managerial abilities.

Development can be done through training in seminars, workshops as well as through experience gained in the work. The best way to encourage employee development is to offer rewards through promotion.

Another means of employee development is rotational responsibility. In this scenario, the leadership position in a group does not permanently rest on one employee but rather revolves around after a certain period of time.

Through this, all the employees will develop in terms leadership as well as technical skills. Apart from that they will also appreciate the challenges being faced by the leaders and therefore respond more supportively whenever a challenging situation emerge.

Having an ongoing dialogue platform is also a very important means to ensure the development of an employee. It is through constant dialogue that the management can find out means and ways to increase the efficiency of an employee.

Dialogue also facilitates a route to feed back to the employee on his performance. With that communication, motivation is built and the employee’s overall performance is increased.

Strategic planning is important in the development of an organization. Involvement of the employees encourages direct contribution towards the plan. The employees feel involved and end owning the plan and not feel as if the plan has been imposed on them.

Involvement can be done at different levels. For instance, a department manager may have a strategic plan meeting with the employees working under him.

He gets the views from these employees on how to improve the plan. The employees feel that they are involved and end up giving their best in order to achieve the goals set in the strategic plan.

The achievement of a goal is easy when the goals are set by the employee themselves than when the goals have been imposed on them.

It is suggested that by allowing the employees to chip in when setting the goals they also get the opportunity to raise the potential challenges that might affect what they are to do in order to achieve these goals.

This makes the manager as well as the employees have ample time to deal with matters which would otherwise affect the performance of an employee.

The creation of independent groups in the organization is recommended as it allows the members to increase their contribution and innovation. This is contrary to the traditional directed groups where innovation was limited and the members just waited to act upon directives given from managers.

Direct groups are those traditional teams that work only upon the directive of their seniors. Here there is inhibition of innovation which is not good for the organization. Their contribution is limited and the motivation is also lacking compared to the self directing groups.

A self directing group is independent and self starting. It therefore makes the performance of employees increase due to the presence of innovation.

Another recommendation is encouraging the employees to have a working social welfare within them. The welfare should be autonomous. Those shall form an avenue for social interaction and bonding.

Bonding and social interaction form the main ingredients of successful teamwork. Giving bonus and other remuneration based benefits to recognize good performance is also a means by which an organization may use to motivate the performance of its employees.

Encouraging team and communication is also recommended in improving the performance of the employee.

Through communication the organization goals reach the employees and through the same the employees are able to communicate the problems that might affect their performance.

Dialogue between the managers and the employees is the best way to clear all the hindrances that affect employee performance.

Armstrong, Michael & Baron, Angela. Performance Management: The New Realities , London: CIPD, 1998. Print

Aslam, Hassan. “Improving Performance Management Practices in IT Firms of Pakistan.” Journal of Management Research 2.2 (2010): 3-6. Print

Elmuti, Dean. “Self managed work teams approach: creative management tool or a fad?” Management Decisions 35.3 (1997): 233-239. Print

Wiese, Danielle & Buckley, Ronald. “The Evolution of The Performance Appraisal Process.” Journal of Management History 4.3 (1998): 233-249. Print

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Home — Essay Samples — Business — Performance Management — The Future of Performance Management

The Future of Performance Management

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Current view of performance management, factors impacting organisations today, implication of these factors to performance management, influential research and its impact on performance management, emerging trends in performance management.

• Macro-Economic Environment;
• Globalisation;
• Increased competition.
• Collaboration;

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Performance Management Process, Essay Example

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Performance Management may be defined as “is the process of creating a work environment or setting in which people are enabled to perform to the best of their abilities. Performance management is a whole work system that begins when a job is defined as needed” (Heathfield, 2010).  A Performance appraisal is defined as being “is the process of obtaining, analyzing and recording information about the relative worth of an employee. The focus of the performance appraisal is measuring and improving the actual performance of the employee” (Naukrihub.com, 2010).  The link is such that performance management is about creating the environment for the employee to succeed and the appraisal measures how well they succeeded in that environment.

Performance Management

Considering the Project Manager function of an IT software development project.  The role entails overseeing the software implementation team for a major Oil Company’s North Sea Oil (offshore) revenue system.  A customized software build of a major business systems application.  As an I/O Psychologist I would be looking at aspects of motivation, environmental settings and efficiencies in order to measure and assess performance.  Motivation One approach might be the adoption of Herzberg Motivation Hygiene Theory. To measure employee motivation you would need to examine such elements as opportunities for promotion, quality of work, levels of responsibility, challenges, sense of personal achievement and growth in the job. Hygiene factors would include: company policies, wages, quality of supervision, inter personal relations, environmental setting, working conditions and feeling of job security.  The approach would be based upon interviewing the team and determining whether they had positive or negative attitudes towards work and an explanation of the reasons thereof.  The Analysis can then be divided into the Motivation and Hygiene classifications. The model depicted above illustrates the staged process. Maslow identified the following hierarchy of needs in order to obtain job satisfaction “Maslow believed that these needs are similar to instincts and play a major role in motivating behaviour. Physiological, security, social, and esteem needs are deficiency needs (also known as D-needs), meaning that these needs arise due to deprivation. Satisfying these lower-level needs is important in order to avoid unpleasant feelings or consequences” (Cherry, 2010).

Works Cited

Cherry, K. (2010). The Five Levels of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs . Retrieved 11 2, 2010, from about.com: http://psychology.about.com/od/theoriesofpersonality/a/hierarchyneeds.htm

Heathfield, S. M. (2010). Performance Management . Retrieved 11 2, 2010, from http://humanresources.about.com/od/glossaryp/g/perform_mgmt.htm

Naukrihub.com. (2010). Performance Appraisal . Retrieved 11 1, 2010, from http://appraisals.naukrihub.com/definition-concept.html

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