Performance appraisals are frequently used within an organization especially by the Human Resources department. Basically, they are evaluations of an employee's achievements and contributions to a company over a set period. It looks at the individual's growth, accomplishments and skills. The study in Kumasi, Gana in 2014 revealed that performance appraisal has a positive relationship with training and development. Therefore, the advantages of them both for employees and the company itself are apparent and clear. Performance reviews with the methods of comparison, rating scales and 360 Feedback have a specific importance and benefit on increasing the profit of an organization and retaining a productive quality workforce through improvement of an employee’s skills, establishing healthy communication and motivation for the employees.
Different performance appraisal methods and techniques are used all over the world. The most common one is rating scales. A manager rates the performance on a continuum - according to the answers of the employees- such as excellent, good, average, fair, and poor. They are very easy to complete; all an employee should do is to read the questions and give answers. However, it may not give the correct result all the time since some employees do not even bother to read the questions. Another method for evaluating the performance is comparisons. In this method, an employee’s performance is evaluated with the performance of another head to head employee. Even though this method may be useful for sales or finances, I don’t think that comparing two individuals is healthy. It may reveal the feeling of being humiliated and may feel inadequate. The best method that is used is 360 Feedback method for me. It is a feedback process where not just your superior but your peers and direct reports and sometimes even customers evaluate you. You receive an analysis of how you perceive yourself and how others perceive you. Since the employee receives the opinions of so many people, I believe this is the most efficient and useful feedback method. It helps the person to evaluate himself/herself with so many perspectives which is very beneficial for improvement.
Finding out the ways that need to be improved, development and training for an employee may be provided with performance appraisals. Actually, this process is very important for employees and the company. An employee can improve himself/ herself if only s/he wants and focuses on his weak spots that are determined in the performance appraisal. Developing the poor skills of an employee will have a positive effect on the quality of the work and therefore overall views of the customers on the company. Training an employee who has aspects that needs to be improved will let him/her be a step closer to perfectionism and professionalism. For example, if a sales assistant has a lack of ability in communication with the customers, a special focus and training on this subject may improve both customer satisfaction and pave the way for personal growth of the employee. Thus, the organization will gain more profits and positive feedback about the work that has been done with a trained employee whose poor skills has already been enhanced with the performance appraisals. Also, training that is specialized for the weaknesses of the employee will let him / her probably have an easier and quicker career growth and be a qualified and demanded employee by the business.
A healthy communication in the business environment is very essential for the company. Lack of communication between the supervisor and the employee may cause time delays, poor quality work, and low productivity which damage the credibleness of the business. The barriers that are caused because of the lack of communication can be eliminated with little conversations about performance appraisals. They may improve efficient communication and collaboration within the company especially between the workers and the managers. Increased cooperation comes with the trust between employees and the managers. An employee who trusts his/her supervisor, may be less stressful, less anxious and more productive in the workplace. With a performance appraisal the manager may realize a situation that is hard for the employee and make changes regarding that or may help the employee. For instance, an employee may not want to talk about the dismission of her husband because of insecurities or personal reasons. This situation may affect her work worse. In the performance review her regress will be observed by the manager. In the conversation about that, the employee may have a chance to have a healthy communication with her manager. When she explains the situation, the manager may try to find some ways to help her and the employee feels more confident and relieved. This affects her work positively. As it is seen in the example performance appraisals increase the team bonds which help to each team member.
Performance appraisals may regularly involve employees in the performance review process and can lead to more engagement and a desire to stay with a company long term. When employees can see how their actions affect the company overall, they are more likely to perform better. It would be a great motivation for the employees. Having a strong motivation in employees is very significant for the quality of the work. Moreover, receiving constructive feedback causes job satisfaction and self-confidence for the workers. For example, when a social media assistant realizes that his post about a product goes viral, feels increased job satisfaction. This may lead to retaining the employees who have a productive quality workforce in the company in the distant future. Also, with the reviews the employees may have an increased self-consciousness about the job they do. This leads and helps them to be a better version of themselves in the workplace.
Performance appraisals are used all over the world in order to assess the contributions of a worker for the business, its growth and its reliability. The most widely used techniques and methods for evaluation are rating scales as well as comparisons and 360 feedback which is the most beneficial one in my mind. The reviews have specific importance about some issues which are development and training, communication and motivation as well as job satisfaction. They lead to improvement of an employee in his/her career growth through training in weaknesses of him/her which affects the organization positively and increases profits plus overall views of consumers. The appraisals also provide a healthy communication between managers and employees, so it increases the team bonds of the department and the integrity of the business. They may also raise the motivation, self-confidence and job satisfaction of the employees which may cause retaining employees within the company in the long term. Consequently, the performance appraisals do not come with only one benefit; they have so many advantages both for the organization and the employee. That’s why it should be used in the workplaces to develop work with higher quality and productivity.
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