Job Description Paper
Week 2 - Instructor Guidance
Week 2 Guidance
Hello everyone and welcome to week two of the course. It was indeed a pleasure reading all of your introductions and getting to know a little bit about each of you. I hope you all enjoyed reading each other's introductions and finding people with whom you have much in common and learning new things from people who you do not. As I stated in my faculty expectations late assignments will not be accepted due to the quick nature of this course. Please familiarize yourself with the due dates of the course and be proactive in your daily planning. Reminder that Day 1 is always Tuesday and Day 7 is always Monday the following week.
Last week we looked at the strategic importance of Human Resource Managements (HRM) activities and how those activities contribute to the achievement of organizational objectives. You should also now be able to identify the functions of HRM within organizations conducting business in a global economy, and will then be able to interpret the key principles of the Equal Employment Opportunity (EE) laws and regulations. I enjoyed reading your interpretations of whether every manager is an HR Manager. It seems that most of you agreed with the article in the text that it is in fact true. Some of you struggled with the SWOT analysis portion from chapter 2 and I can't stress enough how important it is to familiarize yourself with that concept because you will use that technique in many different fields that you go into, especially if you end up in a management level position. They may not call it SWOT, but the concept will still be crucial to the success of any organization.
This week we are going to learn about the importance of performance appraisals, because in your career you will most likely be receiving them and possibly even doing them. You are going to learn about recruitment/selection and various tools that are used both nationally and internationally. Lastly, you will develop a job description that complies with the EEOC guidelines and results in effective hiring of a candidate.
It is critical that you thoroughly review the text. This will help inform your discussions in the class and among your peers. This guidance will 1) review the assignments (weekly deliverables) for the week, 2) include a brief lecture, 3) serve as an APA formatting guide, and 4) provide some APA helpful hints. In general, weekly guidance will follow this format. So let’s get started. Thanks, Jeffery.
Weekly Student Tasks
Classes with Ashford University run for five weeks and move quickly. They tend to be very reading intensive, but in the end will help you submit more developed responses to the assignments. Please make sure to read and review the following student tasks for the week, which include readings and discussions.
Week Two Assignments
Overview
| Activity | Due Date | Format | Grading Percent |
| Performance Management | Day 3 | Discussion | |
| Employee Selection Methods | Day 3 | Discussion | |
| Week Two Quiz | Day 6 | Quiz | 12 |
| Job Description Paper | Day 7 | Assignment | 10 |
Readings
Required. In the text Human Resource Management (Youseff, 2012), read:
· Chapter 4: Recruitment: Attracting the Right Talent
· Chapter 5: Selection, Placement, and Job Fit
· Chapter 6: Performance Appraisal: Measurement, Assessment, and Management
Required Website.
O*NET OnLine. (n.d.). O*NET OnLine. Retrieved from http://www.onetonline.org/ (http://www.onetonline.org/)
The website offers a searchable database of job descriptions and job tasks.
Recommended.
Awkward performance appraisal (n.d.) Vital Smarts Video - YouTube. Retrieved 1/5/2017 from http://youtu.be/gdp4sPviV74
Holloway, P. (n.d.). The right person for the right job. About People. Retrieved January 17, 2017 from http://www.aboutpeople.com/PDFFiles/The%20Right%20Person%20For%20the%20Job.pdf
Episode 62: Human resource recruitment (n.d.). Alanis Business Academy. YouTube - Broadcast Yourself. Retrieved from http://youtu.be/t8-1h09nlw4 (http://youtu.be/t8-1h09nlw4)
This is straight forward discussion of the Recruitment process.
Knightcite - To assist you with writing your references:
· www.knightcite.com
· Select APA formatting
· Select the type of resource you have: (Journal article, book, website, etc.)
· Enter all the information that you have from your source then click submit.
· Copy and paste what it gives you into your assignment.
Note - If you capitalize every word in the title, Knightcite will do same and that's NOT APA standards. Make sure you only capitalize the first letter of first word, the first letter of first word following a colon, formal names and acronyms.
Outcomes Week 2 (4 Assignments)
This week students will:
Assess how Human Resource Information Systems (HRIS) enhances strategic planning.
Analyze the purpose of effective performance appraisals.
Identify a variety of selection tools used both nationally and internationally.
Develop a job description that adheres to the EEOC guidelines and results in effective hiring.
Discussions
To participate in the following Discussion Forums, go to this week's Discussion link in the left navigation:
DQ1 Performance Management. Performance management is an important HRM function as it is the processes and actions taken to align employee performance with organizational objectives. After reading the article, “Ten Biggest Mistakes Bosses Make In Performance Reviews,” discuss three mistakes you have experienced or witnessed in the workplace. What would be your recommendations to correct these mistakes? Cite at least one scholarly source to support your ideas. Respond to at least two of your classmates’ posts by Day 7.
DQ2 Employee Selection Methods. In 200 – 250 words, what are the goals of employee selection? Compare and contrast two selection methods and how these selection methods impact the achievement of organizational objectives? Respond to at least two of your classmates’ postings. Again, read the instructions thoroughly answer the entire question in detail. Same as question 1, your initial post is due by Day 3 and you must respond to at least 2 classmates post by Day 7, which will give you a total of 3 posts that are required for question 2.
Assignment
Job Description Paper
The primary function of the job description paper is to increase students understand of their current or prospective job position. The paper should be in alignment with the position outlined in the introduction discussion forum and the position used in the final paper. The following areas of the job description should be considered:
Tasks,
Tools and Technology,
Knowledge,
Skills and Abilities,
Educational Requirements.
Submit a Job Description paper in which you describe each of the above mentioned areas of job description from the vantage point of your chosen position. Likewise, the paper should include a description of at least two selection methods used to recruit qualified candidates and why these two selection methods would be most appropriate.
Writing the Job Description Paper:
Must be three double-spaced pages in length, excluding the cover page and reference page, and formatted according to APA style as outlined in your approved style guide.
Must include a cover page that includes:
Name of paper
Student's name
Course number and name
Instructor's name
Date submitted
Must include an introductory paragraph with a succinct thesis statement.
Must address the topic of the paper with critical thought.
Must conclude with a restatement of the thesis and a conclusion paragraph.
Must use APA style as outlined in your approved style guide to document all sources.
Must include, on the final page, a Reference List that is completed according to APA style as outlined in your approved style guide and has at least one reference in addition to the text.
Quiz
To complete this quiz, go to this week's Quiz link in the left navigation: This assessment consists of 15 multiple choice and true/false questions. The amount of time the exam will take to complete will vary by individual and you MUST complete the quiz within 1 sitting.
Lecture: Business and Society
Chapter 4 – Recruitment: Attracting the Right Talent
Finding Talent in the External Labor Market
Watch: Episode 62: Human resource recruitment (n.d.). Alanis Business Academy. YouTube - Broadcast Yourself. Retrieved from http://youtu.be/t8-1h09nlw4 (http://youtu.be/t8-1h09nlw4)
As we discussed in chapter 2, it's important to conduct an external environmental scan to forecast what your hiring needs might be in order to reach your strategic goals. Once that is complete, you can begin the grueling process of finding the right candidates for the job. There are a few different ways to do this and you must also know whether your first preference is to obtain the candidates first from within the company or if you would prefer fresh new blood to the organization and want to look externally. Should you choose to look externally first, there are a few different methods you could use for recruiting:
· Advertising - This has changed a lot over the past decades as the level of importance it plays in recruiting. In my parent's years, this was one of the main methods that was used and was quite effective. Newspapers ads, radio, TV, online websites, etc. In fact, you still see in movies today whenever someone is hitting the pavement for jobs, they almost always show them with a newspaper with want ads circling various positions. However, the effectiveness of this process has diminished over the years. The two main things you want to consider if using advertising are:
· Cost - You want to get a return on your investment, so it should be a viable option to access a lot of people at a lower cost.
· Reach - You want to consider how far out this ad will reach. If you are located in a small geographic area, it doesn't do any good to advertise nationally because the odds of people moving there for a job are minimal. Also you want to make sure that the message reaches your target audience too. If you are looking for someone to work as a designer of video games, and you advertise on a radio station that plays the golden oldies whose primary listening audience are in their 60's and up, you are wasting your money.
· Employment Agencies - These are tricky and you have to make sure that you are using them accordingly. They can be a leading resource for job candidates, but are they the right candidates:
· Public - These are agencies that look to find jobs for individuals to avoid the state having to pay unemployment aide to them. The advantage is you know they aren't out to make money, and the cost is generally free. They can do some of the pre-screening for you and expedite the recruitment process. A disadvantage might be that there number one goal is just to avoid having to pay someone unemployment, so their number one goal might not be to provide you with the best list of applicants.
· Private - These are agencies that attempt to find jobs for individuals with some sort of cost involved. The cost can be passed on to the applicant, but most generally it's passed on to the employer. An advantage might be that they have both their companies and the applicant's best interest in mind so they will make sure they have a match, but the disadvantage is the cost that might be associated with that.
· College/University - There are many universities who offer career placement counseling to their students and graduates in attempt to match them with a job that matches their career goals/skills.
· Temp Agencies - Typically they lease employees to other organizations on a temporary basis. The employer pays them the salary for the employee (Say $15.00 / hours) and the agency keeps a portion of that hourly for themselves (Say $4.50 / hour) and pays the rest to the employee.
· Unsolicited Applications - This is when applicants apply for a job even when there isn't a specific job vacancy open at the time. Can save time and money, but doesn't mean you get the best qualified applicants.
· Soliciting Specific Applicants - Similar to unsolicited applicants, only the company solicits an individual they want to recruit who may not have even applied for that position.
Advantages: (Youssef, 2015, p. 98)
The introduction of new individuals into the organization can bring fresh ideas and perspectives, all of which promote a healthy and dynamic organizational culture.
New individuals usually possess diverse experiences from their former jobs, enriching the organization's knowledge base and familiarizing its current employees with competitors' products and practices.
New hires normally require less initial training and supervision, which saves organizations a great deal of time, money, and effort.
Disadvantages:
Selection errors can result if good candidates are not identified—i.e., candidates who have the skill sets required to fulfill the job duties and responsibilities or have the right personality, attitude, or organizational cultural background to fit into the hiring organization.
Qualified internal candidates within the organization can be disappointed when they have unsuccessfully sought one of these openings as a promotion or a desirable lateral move. This disappointment can lead to perceptions of betrayal and violated psychological contracts; can compromise loyalty and commitment to the organization; and can lead to numerous morale, attitudinal, and behavioral problems.
It may take some time for new hires to adapt to a new organizational culture or environment. This time can translate into additional cost.
Finding Talent Internally
For some companies, this is a very crucial practice. For one, internal candidates already know the culture of the organization. If you already know them to be a good fit within the company, then it's an obvious move to promote them into a new position. It also gives you a competitive advantage. People generally want to work somewhere that they know they can be promoted. If they see preference is given to internal candidates first, this might encourage them to stay on board with your organization.
· Promoting from Within - Just as it sounds, taking an internal candidate and promoting them into a higher level position because you already know their ability to be successful and how they might fit within the organization.
· Lateral Transfers - We use these a lot in my current organization. So it's not that someone receives a promotion, which is vertical on the hierarchy, they simply move into another position on the same level. We have a process called "Request for Reassignment" where employees can submit to be transferred in the same position to a different department.
· Employee Referrals - From my personal experience, this is the best method to recruit. The reason is because your current employees already know the culture of the organization, and might even know what the position that is vacant requires. They are less apt to put their name on someone who they don't think would be a good employee or that they would not want to work alongside every day. So you can generally assume if they've been referred they are a candidate worth looking at.
Advantages: (Youssef, 2015, p. 98)
· It raises the morale of promoted individuals as they develop more security, sense of commitment, and loyalty to the organization.
· Employees promoted internally become more satisfied, productive, and efficient, and their performance and work generally become better.
· It is generally easier to make an accurate judgment about an internal employee's skills, abilities, performance indicators, technical experience, and personality characteristics, which ultimately results in a better determination for job compatibility and placement.
· Internal recruitment costs are considerably lower compared to such external sources as job agencies.
Disadvantages:
· It does not introduce new ideas, experiences, or cultures to the organization.
· It does introduce possible rivalries among employees who compete for the same job opening, lowering employee morale and productivity.
· Employees can grow distracted from their main job tasks and become involved instead in political engagements that might lead to promotions.
· More training and development are needed for the tasks and responsibilities associated with the new position for an internally promoted employee than for an externally hired recruit with the relevant set of experiences. This disparity is particularly evident in internal promotions to managerial or supervisory positions.
Designing an HR Talent Inventory
The text states that the effective design of an HR talent inventory includes tracking:
· the KSAs and competencies acquired by current employees
· promotions and lateral movements
· training and development opportunities
· performance appraisals
· changes in assigned tasks, duties, and responsibilities
Linking Recruitment to the HRM Process
The main thing to remember here is that recruitment is essential to achieving the strategic goals of the organization. The HR professional is responsible for knowing what those goals are, knowing what skills and experiences are needed for the jobs that will help achieve that goal, and then recruiting the right people to fill those positions.
Opportunities, Challenges, and Recent Development in Recruiting Talent
These include recruiting in a competitive environment, legal and economic issues, an employer's ability to attract candidates, the rise of social networking, alternative work arrangements, globalization, an organization's internal challenges, labor relations, and the expectations of both employers and employees in the recruiting process. With the current state of the economy and grim prospects of the job market, there are a lot of people who are out there looking for jobs. Making sure you get to the most qualified applicants means that you may have to sift through a lot of unqualified applicants to find them. Lazy HR managers settle before they get the right person in the interest of time or money in trying to fill a position. How do you think social networking has an impact on recruiting talent?
Chapter 5 - Selection, Placement, and Job Fit
What Should You Select For?
Before reading this chapter, read The Right Person for the Right Job article by Pamela Holloway. She talks about the importance of selecting the right candidate for the job. This article will help provide valuable insight to what you are going to read in the upcoming chapter.
What should you select for:
· Individual differences - An organization needs to know what traits are important within their culture and also within the position that they are hiring for. This also would require knowing if the applicant possesses those traits which would help make them more successful.
· Human Capital: Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities - This doesn't have anything to do with the individual's personality, but it solely based on what skills, knowledge, and abilities the person is bringing to the organization. This can be determined by their past achievements.
· Social Capital - Those who are skilled at working with interpersonal relationships, networking, etc.
· Positive Psychological Capital - Unlike traits, these can change over time and be influenced by the environment in which one works. Confidence, optimism, etc. are all part of positive psychological capital.
· Attitudes - This one is one of the most important to me. An employee's poor attitude can ruin the entire morale of an organization. Can you think of a time where you worked somewhere that employed someone in your area who had a negative toxic attitude? How did they make you feel? Did it affect your desire to go into work daily? Did it even affect your productivity?
Job Fit
• Person-Organization Fit - Simply put, this is when the organization looks at their own values, attitude, and beliefs to ensure that the potential candidate matches those same values and ideas. If you were a company who thrived on taking risks and being spontaneous, you wouldn't want to hire an individual in your company who liked to play things safe and follow tradition. I once worked for a supervisor in a company that promoted open door policy, respect for all employees, and always treating its employees as if they were the #1 asset in your company. This supervisor was never available; he yelled at employees, he had a huge ego etc. The company eventually realized they had hired someone who didn't fit within their organization's values.
• Person - Job Fit - This is matching the skills, knowledge and abilities of the person to the job you are hiring them for. For example, in one of my roles in HR, we had a department that sold trendy, young, relatively inexpensive clothing to young girls, similar to what they might wear on a fun night out with the girls or to a local night club. A department was desperate to hire this woman who was extremely professional, well groomed, sophisticated, and spoke very eloquently. Against HR's advice, they hired her for the position. It wasn't that she wasn't a fit for the organization, but she wasn't a fit for that particular job. She never made her sales goals, she got complaint after complaint that she was rude and snobby, and customers simply did not like her. Shortly after, an opening came up in the Couture department. This was a department that sold designer clothes that marketed to an older, more established customer. She ended up being a top salesperson in that department, because she knew exactly how to connect with those clients.
Selection Methods
• Resumes/Applications - This is when companies screen either resumes or applications to match the skills/experience of the applicant with the job they are applying for. My personal opinion is that I do not like resumes. They are controlled by the applicant, meaning every applicant can design their differently. Imagine having to skim 100 resumes a day and everything is in different places with a different lay out. Not to mention, resumes are not signed legal documents, and so you can't legally hold an applicant to honesty if they lie about something they include on a resume. A signed application for your company, you can. I much prefer reviewing applications hands down.
• Testing -There are a multitude of tests that an organization can give in order to screen their applicants. Once they have their list of applicants narrowed down they can put them through either aptitude, knowledge/skills, or cognitive tests to see if they are a good fit. The two main type that are used are aptitude and achievement. I mentioned in week 1, my current organization requires every applicant to take a knowledge/skills test that is designed specifically for that position. Their scores places them competitively in line for that position.
• Interviews - In my years in HR I have conducted a variety of interviews, unstructured, structured, situational, behavioral, and in panel or group interviews. Group can mean multiple people interviewing or multiple candidates being interviewed at the same time. They all have their advantages and disadvantages, but my personal opinion is that structured interviews are probably the best one to follow. Namely because you can assure that EVERY candidate has consistently been interviewed the same and had the opportunity to answer the same questions. The last thing you want is a lawsuit because one candidate feels they were discriminated against by questions you did or didn't ask during an interview that you did ask someone else.
• Reference checks -This is probably my least favorite method of selection. The reasons are that with the current state of laws that have been passed, the majority of employers are adamant that they not give references on former employees under any circumstance. It's pretty much just good to verify that someone did work there when they said they did, what title they said they have, and some companies might say if they are eligible for rehire or not, but that's about it. If you ask the individual to provide you references, you know that they are 95% selecting references they know will give them an excellent reference.
• Honesty tests, medical exams, drug testing - These are generally more rare but can happen. If the job entails some harder physical aspects, such as police officer, they may require you to undergo a medical exam prior to employment. Some companies require drug testing to ensure that you are not someone who might put them at risk.
Foundational Concepts in Designing and Evaluating Selection Methods
Validity is "the extent to which a selection tool or procedure can accurately predict subsequent performance. Validity is an extremely important factor to consider when designing or evaluating selection methods" (Youssef, 2012, p. ) Five validity dimensions are multiple facets of the same concept and should be considered in conjunction, rather than individually:
Criterion-related validity
Content-related validity
Construct validity
Face validity
External validity
Reliability is "the extent to which it is possible to replicate the results from a predictor such as a selection tool, method, or procedure. For example, a reliable interview protocol should yield the same conclusion about the same applicant" (Youssef, 2012, p. ).
Increasing the Validity and Reliability of the Selection Process
· Better by design: Creating and using more valid and reliable methods - Finding that balance between validity and reliability. For example I mentioned I didn't like resumes because they were created by the applicant. However they are more valid because they allow the applicant to more freely expand on the skills and abilities. However they are less reliable than the application. So some companies require both resumes and applications to check for validity and reliability. The same can be said between structured interviews (reliable) and unstructured (validity). A good balance might be following a structured format, but allowing the interviewee to go off topic and elaborate and follow up with questions accordingly.
· Better by implementation: Training those who select and overcoming personal biases - You want to make sure you have the right team of people trained and developed to conduct the right kind of interviews for your organization. In my last HR role, we all had to be "Talent Plus Certified" which means we were trained on a specific structured interview style and coached on what verbal and nonverbal cues to look for. In my current role, we are trained to only look at those things that have specific relevance to the knowledge, skills, and abilities to do the job.
· Better by integration: Linking selection to the HRM process - as every chapter has said, it's a crucial component to reaching the strategic goals of the organization.
Legal Issues in Selection
· Equal Employment Opportunity - Title VII of the Civil Rights Act protects those classes related to sex, religion, race, color, or national origin. The EEO Act of enforces the Title VII act to make sure those classes are protected and adds the class of age and disability.
· Age Discrimination - The Age Discrimination Act of 1967 protects those individuals 40 and over from being discriminated against on the basis of hiring, terminating, promoting, or pay. It should be noted that those under 40 are NOT protected by this law and therefore could be discriminated against for being too young.
· Discrimination Based on Disability - We discussed this in Chapter 3, but the Americans with Disabilities Act prohibits discrimination against those with disabilities who could otherwise do the job with reasonable accommodation. This does not only include physical disability or anything obvious to the human eye.
· Other Employment Laws
· National Labor Relations Act - Legalized Unions and Collective Bargaining
· Equal Pay Act - Prohibits pay differentials between genders across similar jobs.
· Pregnancy Discrimination Act - Prohibits dismissal of an employee due to pregnancy and secures their job to return to work.
· Immigration Reform Act - Prohibits hiring illegal aliens.
· Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act - Requires a 60 day notice to close down or massive layoffs.
· Employee Polygraph Protection Act - Limits the scope of lie detectors and prohibits them as the sole use in making hiring or firing decisions.
· Family Medical Leave Act - Organizations with 50 or more employees who have worked for 1 year are granted up to 12 weeks unpaid leave to care for an immediate family member.
· Foundational Concept
· Disparate Treatment - Cannot institute policies that may have a discriminatory impact on a protected class. For instance, if you set height and weight limits, this might prevent women and some ethnic minorities that tend to be shorter or heavier from employment.
· Disparate Impact - This is when the procedure actually has a discriminatory effect on the individual and deems the practice illegal.
· Quid Pro Quo - I'll do this for you if you do this for me. Exchange of sexual favors to get something at work.
· Hostile Work Environment - Preventing someone from being able to do their job through harassing or offending remarks, sexual, racial, or otherwise.
· Reverse Discrimination - Hiring a less qualified female over a more qualified white male is reverse discrimination. The affirmative action means that if the female is equally or more qualified, she should be hired over the white male, not less qualified.
Opportunities, Challenges, and Recent developments in Employee Selection and Job Fit
· Legal and regulatory opportunities and challenges in employee selection- New legislation changes every year, managerial and executive orders, and court decisions, all of which impact the world of HR.
· Sociocultural developments- Changing societal expectations or norms in the workforce that have an impact on the labor market as a whole. For example, more millennials are entering the workforce now and baby boomers are retiring. Their needs and wants from a job/company are completely different.
· Global and competitive factors- Global recruiting is extremely challenging and can be more costly.
· Impact of selection and job fit on employee motivation, morale, productivity, and retention- "Individuals approach organizations with many needs, desires, and expectations. Those individuals also come from a variety of backgrounds with different skills, experiences, capabilities, and personal perceptions. " (Youssef, 2012, p. ).
· Selection, unions, and labor relations - All the activities of unions have a direct effect on HR managers.
Chapter 6 - Performance Appraisal: Measurement, Assessment, and Management
What is Performance?
Employee Productivity - is "defined as the ratio of the actual employee production to the planned or anticipated production for the core set of functions, duties, and responsibilities of the job performed" (Youssef, 2012, p. ). Very often there are minimum standards imposed on employees that they must achieve within a job. Can you think of one you have had in a current or past job? For me, when I finished high school, I worked for a company that processed Medicare claims and we were required to enter a certain amount of claims each hour with a certain percentage of accuracy (or quality).
Employee Attitudes - can be " defined as cognitive and emotional appraisals that shape subsequent behavioral tendencies. Employees' attitudes have a direct influence on their productivity, as well as on the organizational culture as a whole" (Youssef, 2012, p. ). Positive attitudes can be job satisfaction, employee engagement, and work commitment. Negative attitudes can be cynicism or disengagement.
Work Behaviors - Performance is often visualized in terms of productivity and efficiency. However, the following elements of performance should also be considered in evaluations of employee performance:
· Coaching, mentoring, or supporting new coworkers
· Sharing skills and experience
· Promoting a friendly work environment and a healthy team spirit
· Abiding by and encouraging others to follow organizational norms, regulations, and procedures
· Assisting employees with their emotional and personal problems
Team Performance - A good company is more of the sum of its individual's performance but rather as the unit as a whole. Some companies measure the individual's performance against that of its' unit, while other companies measure the unit's performance against that of the company's.
What is Performance Appraisal and Why is it Important?
Watch this video: Awkward performance appraisal (n.d.) Vital Smarts Video - YouTube. Retrieved 1/5/2014 from http://youtu.be/gdp4sPviV74
When you need to assess the performance an individual has achieved in a certain position, it is crucial that you conduct a performance appraisal. There shouldn't be any surprises in the employee's performance appraisal, unlike in the video, because a good manager makes sure that the employee knows and understands their strengths and weaknesses throughout the time frame they are being reviewed. Times frames for performance appraisals can vary between 30 day, 60 day, 90 day, 6 months, and annual. You should communicate up front to the employees when they are being reviewed so they also know that too.
Organizations use performance appraisals for many purposes such as
· managing salaries, wages, and pay adjustments
· providing performance feedback for employees and communicating points of strength and weakness
Performance appraisals are also used by management
· To determine job placement decisions such as promotions, demotions, and transfers
· To justify employee disciplinary actions such as termination or dismissal
Common Performance Appraisal Methods
· Narrative Technique - I don't care for this method as much. It's simply the evaluator providing a written essay on how they feel about the employees' performance being reviewed. It's very subjective in nature.
· Critical Incident Method - This is one of my favorites, but it requires a lot more work from the manager throughout the performance time. Each time a critical incident occurs (positive or negative) the manager records it. Then when it comes time to write the review they have everything right in front of them, instead of having to remember back in time and not only remember negative or positive depending on their bias or prejudice against the employee.
· Management by Objective - This is fairly common. The manager and the employee set pre-determined goals and objectives that should be achieved. Then during the review they are measured against those objectives and a new action plan is put into place.
· Graphic Rating Scale -A manager lists all the criteria associated with that job, and then rates the employee on each criteria on a scale, say from 1-10. Not as commonly used.
· Behaviorally Anchored Rating Scale -Similar to the graphic rating scale, except for that each measurement is associated with a behavior to demonstrate it so employee knows what that looks like.
· Forced-Distribution Method -If used correctly, can be good, but I don't think most managers are as skilled in using this the right way. Basically the manager takes their entire staff and then allocates that the top 25% will get excellent, the next 25% will get above average and so on. I don't care for it because it forces someone into a category they may not fall into or pushes them out of one they should have been in.
· Paired Comparison Method - Comparing two or more employees against each other doing the same job. Not used very often in my experience.
Performance Measurement
The main thing to consider here is that you want a healthy balance of subjective and objective measurement for each employee. You need measurements that are clear cut and easy for the employee to understand. For example, stating that the employee fails to arrive to work on time is objective because it can be measured by time clock punch ins or punch outs. However stating the employee doesn't appear to be committed to his/her job is very subjective. What things are you using to measure that by?
Validity and Reliability: (from the text)
· For a performance appraisal system to be deemed valid, its results should correlate to objective performance standards. For example, an appraisal system that yields similar evaluations across the board, regardless of actual performance, has low validity.
· A reliable performance appraisal system should yield consistent results. For instance, an effective performance appraisal system must result in the same conclusions about an employee's performance, regardless of such variations in input factors as the manager conducting the appraisal, the time of day, or the location of the evaluation.
Linking Performance Appraisal to the HRM Process
I think succession planning is one of the most critical ways to link performance appraisals to the HRM process. If you aren't telling your employees where they are versus where they need to be, then how can you expect them to help you reach the overall goals and objectives of the organization? I once worked at a job that didn't conduct any type of review process at all. We had 18 people doing the same thing every day and not once did anyone of us know if we were doing things appropriately or not. It was all our own self-managed opinions of if we were or not. I could look at certain coworkers and think "wow, they are really slacking!" and then I'd hear them say "wow, I'm really overworked". When the department started failing to meet any of their goals and enrollment started to drop immensely over time, they caught on quick that they needed to be more involved with the development of their employees.
Opportunities, Challenges, and Recent Developments in Performance Management (From text 6.6)
1. Stereotyping can yield inaccurate results against employees who belong to particular groups, which can be both unfair and discriminatory. For example, a manager who perceives younger employees to be naïve, lazy, or spoiled may give them lower evaluations regardless of their performance.
2. The halo effect can trigger erroneous judgments about an employee based on a limited number of performance dimensions. For example, a well-groomed employee may also receive favorable but undeserved evaluations on other performance dimensions such as being organized and having exceptional social skills.
3. Availability is another source of bias that influences evaluators in their performance assessments. Many individuals cannot clearly differentiate between the importance of a factor and its frequency of occurrence. Rather than focusing on major factors, evaluators tend to subconsciously remember and give more weight in their performance evaluation to recurring factors, no matter how minor they are.
4. Self-fulfilling prophecies can also interfere with performance appraisals. We tend to see what we expect to see. Research shows that when other things are equal, if managers poorly judge employees to be failures and expect these employees to fail, then the employees are likely to fail. On the other hand, if a manager believes in an employee and expects him or her to succeed, then he or she will be likely to succeed. This different outcome is probably due to the manager's intentionally or unintentionally investing more effort, resources, and support in the second kind of employee—making the manager's unsubstantiated prophecies come true.
5. The fundamental attribution error is that people have the tendency to attribute their own successes to internal causes and their own failures to external factors, while doing the opposite when they assess others' successes and failures. They blame others for their failures but do not give them enough credit for their successes. If left unchecked, this common attributional bias can be detrimental to performance appraisal. It can contribute toward employee perceptions of evaluator unfairness, which in turn can adversely affect employee performance and morale. Attributional bias can also lead to managers' feeling resentment and hostility toward their employees, whom they perceive to be lazy and irresponsible rather than constrained by situational factors. Finally, attributional bias can result in erroneous action plans, such as disciplining or terminating.
APA Helpful Hints
As I have mentioned in several places throughout the course materials, APA is a required component of all of your courses within Ashford University. When you are writing formal assignments it will require you to use running heads on your paper, you will also need to use headers and sub headers like I have demonstrated here to better organize your work. When using direct quotes you need to cite the author, the year, and the page or paragraph number you obtained the quote from (one “p” if it is from one page, two “pp” if the quote was from multiple pages). You should always use Times New Roman with a 12 pt. font. Look up how to appropriately use block quotes for those quotes that are 40 words or longer (these should be used sparingly). As mentioned earlier I included some APA hints in this guidance. All subsequent guidance will not have this so it will be up to you to get it accurate on your own. Please visit http://www.apastyle.org/ for additional APA information.
References
Awkward performance appraisal (n.d.) Vital Smarts Video - YouTube. Retrieved 1/5/2017 from http://youtu.be/gdp4sPviV74
Episode 62: Human resource recruitment (n.d.). Alanis Business Academy. YouTube - Broadcast Yourself. Retrieved from http://youtu.be/t8-1h09nlw4 (http://youtu.be/t8-1h09nlw4)
Holloway, P. (n.d.). The right person for the right job. About People. Retrieved January 17, 2017 from http://www.aboutpeople.com/PDFFiles/The%20Right%20Person%20For%20the%20Job.pdf
Youssef, C. (2015). Human resource management. San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint Education.
