HRM 5820 Test 3 Flashcards

What is Performance Management?

Process by which managers ensure that employees’ activities are congruent with organizational goals. Has three broad components:

1. Defining Performance
2. Measuring Performance
3. Delivering Performance Feedback

What from Job Analysis do we look at to determine what “good performance” could look like?

KSAOs

Job Performance is not just KSAOs, what 3 things make up Job Performance

Task Performance

Citizenship Behavior

Counterproductive Workplace Behavior

Organizational Citizenship Behavior

Discretionary “extra mile” behaviors that fall outside of an employee’s job description and that (in the aggregate) promote the effective functioning of the organization.

What kinds of concepts make up OCB?

Altruism, Civic Virtue, Sportsmanship, Courtesy

Altruism

Helping and assisting coworkers in need

Civic Virtue

Participating in optional functions in order to be a better corporate citizen

Sportsmanship

Maintaining a positive attitude, even in bad times

Courtesy

Maintaining a positive attitude, even in bad times

Counterproductive Workplace Behavior

Any intentional behavior on the part of an employee that, when viewed from the organization’s perspective, is contrary to its legitimate interests.

CWB Examples

Theft, Destruction of Property, Misuse of information, Unsafe Behavior, Substance Abuse

What tools do we use to test our measures of Performance?

Reliability, Validity, Specificity, Strategic Congruence

Reliability

Degree to which our measure is free from random error

What kind of Reliability do we use in Performance Evaluation?

In performance evaluation, we typically assess reliability with “inter-rater” reliability -- do multiple judges agree about an employee’s performance levels?

Validity

Degree to which our measure assesses all relevant (and only relevant) aspects of performance

To not have deficiency means to…

comprehensively evaluate all of the true dimensions of job performance

to not have contamination/noise means to…

only evaluate using measures composed of true dimensions of job performance

Validity in the context of Deficiency and Contamination means…

To have as little deficiency and contamination as possible in our measure of performance.

Specificity

The degree to which a performance measure gives specific guidelines to employees about what is expected of them and how they can meet these expectations

What are the two main components of Specificity

Behavioral expectations
Behaviors that need to be improved

Strategic Congruence

The extent to which the performance management system elicits job performance that is consistent with the organization’s strategy, goals, and culture

Strategic Congruence: Central Question

Does the measure reinforce the kinds of behaviors that support company goals?

“We want to be known for customer service”

• So use customer service to evaluate people!

“We want to be known for innovation”

• So use innovation to evaluate people!

What are the 4 major approaches to measuring performance

Global Approach

Behavioral Approach

Attribute Approach

Results Approach

What is the Global-General Approach?

Do the following:

• About 5 minutes before the performance appraisal session, sit in your office and think back on employee’s performance. Go with the image you have in your head of that person -- your gut feeling.

Generally unreliable and invalid

Global-General Approach Biases

There are a lot of Rater Biases

• Similar to Me

• Mood/Affect

• Halo and Horns

• Distributional Errors

  • Leniency

  • Strictness

  • Central Tendency

What’s the Halo/Horns Effect

One value/behavior of the individual affects the rest of the ratings

Global-Comparative Approach (Simple Ranking)

In an effort to combat distributional errors (e.g., leniency, strictness, central tendency, etc.), just rank employees

• Overall ranking

• Paired comparison ranking

Their ranking then determines their performance evaluation

Global-Comparative Approach Simple Ranking downside?

Lacks Validity

Global-Comparative Approach (Paired-Comparison Ranking)

Compare each employee with each other employee to establish rankings

Pros:

• Counteracts tendency to rate everyone favorably/near the center

• Can erase tendency to evaluate behavior more strictly/leniently

Cons:

• Time consuming

• Often not linked to the organization’s goals

What are the Attribute Approaches?

Start off by using job analysis to identify all critical KSAOs

• Then design some sort of questionnaire that assesses the key attributes necessary for those KSAO’s

Two popular designs:

• Graphic rating scale

• Mixed standard scale

Attribute Approach Graphic Rating Scale Downsides

Low Reliability: managers are likely to arrive at different judgements

Particularly vulnerable to distributional errors (Leniency, strictness, & central tendency)

Attribute Approach Mixed Rating Scale

Take list of key attributes and:

• Create statements for high, medium, and low levels of them

Mix up all of the statements

Rate employees according to whether they are better, worse, or the same as the statement

What are the Behavioral Approaches?

Start off by using job analysis to identify all critical tasks

Then design some sort of questionnaire to assess the behaviors critical to those tasks

Three popular approaches:

• Critical-incident method

• Behaviorally Anchored Rating Scales (BARS)

• Behavioral Observation Scale (BOS)

Behavioral Approach - Critical Incident Method

Identify and collect Critical Incidents that demonstrate behaviors critical to job performance

Use these Critical Incidents as evidence/measures of the employee’s Job Performance

Behavioral Approach - Critical Incident Method Downside

It’s hard to keep track of critical incidents from a manager’s perspective

Behavioral Approach - BARS

Builds on the critical-incident technique

Take list of behaviors and:

• Compile a list of “critical incidents” exemplifying good and bad behaviors

• Organize the critical incidents into different performance dimensions

• Rank the critical incidents

• Use those critical incidents as anchors on a rating scale

Behavioral Approach - BOS

Take list of behaviors and:

• Compile a list of “critical incidents” exemplifying good and bad behaviors

• Use those critical incidents as things to be rated using numerical scales

• Average the scores across all behaviors to get an overall performance measures

What is the difference between BARS & BOS?

BOS starts the same way as BARS, with critical incidents of good and bad performance. The difference is what the manager does with them. A BARS rater picks one point on a scale. A BOS rater rates how often the employee does every listed behavior, then adds up the scores and averages them.

BARS discards many examples (i.e., critical incidents) to create rating scales

BOS uses many of the examples to define all behaviors
necessary for effective performance

• So, BOS may use 15 behaviors to define levels of performance

BOS, also, rates the frequency by which employees engage in the given behaviors

Behavioral Approach - BOS Downsides

Requires a lot of information

• May have 80 or more behaviors

• Requires manager to remember how often an employee engaged in those behaviors during the rating period

• Not just for one employee! Sometimes, managers have to rate

as many as ten or fifteen

What is the Results Approach?

Observes results rather than Behaviors or KSAOs represented in the employee.

Very straightforward in jobs where objective performance criteria are available, such as productivity, quality, efficiency, or customer service ratings

In cases where objective performance criteria are not available, objective data are replaced by data on goal achievement

Results Approach - Management by Objectives

Each level of company sets difficult goals for the level below

• Goals work best when they are:

• Both difficult and specific, rather than no goals, easy goals, or “do your best” goals

• Employees participate in setting goals

• Employees are provided with feedback on progress toward goal

Results Approach - Management by Objectives Examples

Timely completion of specific projects

Completion of relevant training courses

Improvements in customer satisfaction measures

Addition of new clients

Results Approach - Management by Objectives Pros/Cons

Advantages:

• Evaluation of results can be less subjective than other kinds of performance measurement

• Relatively easy to link to organizational goals

Disadvantages:

• If only final results are measured, you may not measure significant aspects of performance that are not directly related to those results

• There may not be any guidance for how to improve

• Problems with validity due to situational constraints

What are the two primary goals of delivering performance feedback?

Acceptance of evaluation

Behavioral adjustment after evaluation

Perceived fairness of feedback delivery is enhanced by

Giving employee’s a chance to participate using a self-evaluation

Delivering feedback respectfully

Explaining the reasons behind the evaluation completely and honestly

Making the experience consistent across persons and across time

Feedback should be…

What should it encourage?

Developmental

Solving Problems

Improving Behaviors and results

Agreement on specific goals

development of a timetable to review these goals

In delivering feedback, what promotes employee engagement?

Accomplishments are recognized

Opportunities for advancement are identified

They see a future for themselves in the organization

What are the three performance feedback approaches

which one is the most effective?

which one is used most often?

Tell-and-sell (most used)

Tell-and-listen

Problem-solving (most effective)

Focus on <BLANK>, not <BLANK> when giving feedback

Behaviors, Personalities

Star performers should also receive feedback because it keeps them…

engaged, focused, and motivated.