Performance Management – Philosophy

Written By: Harsh Thakkar on January 29, 2012 No Comment

The philosophy behind performance management can be captured in the following six core strategies:

Clarify job responsibilities and clearly state agreed-upon goals (or performance expectations/ performance standards/ performance criteria)
Communicate regularly by giving and receiving feedback throughout the year on performance, goals, directions, and changing expectations.
Counsel to improve performance problems and/ or develop employee performance
Compare performance to agreed-upon goals periodically and evaluate results.
Cultivate continuous learning, employee growth, and development.
Celebrate exemplary performance.

Hence, performance management would require a pro-active approach to management of HR, a congenial work culture, and value-based management.

The pre-requisites of Performance Management by which its success or failure depends on is as follows:

Organizational philosophies
Attitudes and skills of those responsible for its implementation
Acceptance, commitment, and ownership of managers and employees
Endorsement of the notions of ‘procedural fairness’ and ‘distributive justice’ (procedural fairness refers to the employees’ perception on overall process equity, and where ‘distributive justice’ is linked to perceptions of the fairness of associated rewards and recognition outcomes)
Top-management commitment and involvement
Adequacy of pay-level or compensation package
Availability or access to resources, tools, and skills to employees to do their jobs
Scope for managers to have the power to make decisions and plan on the basis of needs
Familiarity of mangers and employees with planning tools such as target setting and achievement monitoring
Effectiveness of communications between and within management and employees
A culture of accountability and openness prevails
Financial requirements of the organization
Decentralization
Customer’s pressure and quality assurance