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THE EFFECT OF PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL IN A HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT A CASE STUDY OF ALVAN IKOKU COLLEGE OF EDUCATION OWERRI

Dept: BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION File: Word(doc) Chapters: 1-5 Views:

Abstract

The topic of the study “the effeCt of performance appraisal in Human resources management, a case study of Alvan Ikoku College of Education in chosen bearing in mind its crucial effect in Human Resources management. Implicitly, every individual in an organization is a unique combination of characteristics. This therefore places a manager in a difficult position as regards the determination and assessment of those characteristics that a partial or employer possesses and which are important for making the employee to put up his or her best performance on the job. The respondents during the research survey the presentation and analysis took the form of the data obtained from the completed questionnaire. This was followed by he testing of the hypothesis to proved the acceptability or rejection of the important questions. In doing this, the researcher used percentage technique in analyzing all the questions in the questionnaire and research questions while chi-sq

1.1  BACKGROUND STATEMENT

In any business organization or institution, effective use of human resources requires a complete knowledge of employees capabilities and an effective record system. To achieve this objective, it has become necessary to regularly take stock of the experience and exposure levels of employees with a view to identifying those staff with potentials for development. This could be done with the aid of performance appraisal.

Performance appraisal could be defined as the process of measuring performance and assessing the level of performance of the organizational members. It is one of the most delicate issues in human resources management, because an employee’s overall success in an organization depends largely on the outcome of performance appraisal. It is pertinent to state here that some bosses take advantage of this to undermine prospect of employees they do not like. Thus, a proven performance appraisal system linking organization and employees goals is of paramount important because it can serve as a development tool to counsel and motivate employees. Furthermore, it could as well assist employees to understand what is expected of them in a job and where they fit into an organization.

The fact that they are scarcely few employees who would not like to know exactly that their manager thinks of their performance makes performance appraisal scheme a controversial subject.

In small organization with few employees, the level of information between the manager and employees is so close that employees generally, know what their boss thinks of them. However, in large institution such as Alvan, the degree of interaction is so remote that many employees find it difficult to predict precisely what manager thinks of them.

In contemporary atmosphere of world-wide recession and especially in Nigeria, of downright economic gloom characterize by massive unemployment and increasing number of employees redundancy, those organizations including Alvan which are holding their own are likely to be much more interested in maximizing the effective use of existing personnel than being new staff. It follows therefore, that is performance appraisal is properly utilized, it could go a long way in assisting the management of the institution in its human resources planning and development.

Performance appraisal is one of the most important tasks of any manager. Douglas Mc Gregor (1972) sees it a process that involves communication to a person how he or she is performing on the job.

• STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

Most organizations are rightfully quite interested in determining the quality and level of performance of their employees in assessing the potentials they demonstrate for future development and in identifying areas of weakness that many require assistance and training.

The process appraising the performance of employees is made difficult by the fact that criteria of effective and ineffective performance are frequently difficult to define, the areas of performance for which an individual is responsible are often unclear and evaluations tend to be based not in measurements of actual performance but on the perception and judgments of an employee’s immediate boss, some of these vague ambiguous and judgmental characteristics of performance appraisal in organizations are unavoidable because of the complexity of managerial jobs and the difficulties in clearly defining concrete criteria of effective performance.

At the same time however, a considerable proportion of the vagueness and ambiguity associated with the appraisal process can be attributed to inadequate attention being paid by organization to the design and functioning of its performance appraisal system.

In this context, the researcher is particularly doubtful of the extent to which the employees of Alvan are usually satisfied after the outcome of each appraisal exercise. This is because instance abound where a staff has spent over nine (9) years on one post without promotion, one is therefore, tempted to conclude that performance appraisal is not so effective in assisting management to select the right people for advancement.

Furthermore, it appears that the general feeling among the Alvan staff is that appraisal is not properly utilized hence it could not achieve the desired objective. This simply implies that all is not well with the way performance appraisal is being conducted in Alvan Ikoku College of Education.

• PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

Specifically, this research is in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the award of the Higher National Diploma in Business Administration.

More so, the study will among others thing attempt to:

1. Evaluate the strength of performance appraisal in supplying data that could help the institution management to make an efficient use of its human resources.
2. Find out how effective is the use of performance appraisal as a tool for determining promotion, salary increase and training.
3. Find out whether the employees of the institution are usually satisfied with the ways they are being appraised by their supervisors.
4. Highlight whether performance appraisal is presently used creates a learning experience for their employees of the institution to motivate them on improving their level of performance on the job.
5. Critically examine the advantage and drawbacks associated with the use of performance appraisal and make useful recommendations to both workers and management.
   • RESEARCH QUESTIONS

These questions include:

1. Should an employee be rewarded based on his or her scores in performance appraisal reports?
2. Is the present appraisal scheme appropriate for determining the training and development needs of staff?
3. Is the present appraisal scheme appropriate for promotion and salary increment?
4. What method of approach of performance evaluation management is using.
5. In what areas has the institution’s performance scheme created an impact on employees?
6. Are performance appraisal reports usually a true reflection of employee’s strength and weakness?
   • RESEARCH HYPOTHESIS

The following answers to the above questions will help to defined and emphasize the importance and effect of performance appraisal in human resource management.

1. Ho: An employee should be rewarded based on his or                     her scores in performance appraisal report.

Hi:   An employee should not be rewarded based on his                    or her scores in performance appraisal report.

1. Ho: Performance appraisal reports usually are true                   reflection of employees strengthen and weakness.

Hi:   Performance appraisal reports are not usually                           reflection for employees strength and weakness.

• SCOPE OF THE STUDY

The scope of this researcher is on the effect of performance appraisal in human resource management, a case study of Alvan Ikoku College of Education Owerri and it is being restricted only to Alvan workers both the employees and the employees of the institution in order to find out if performance appraisal scheme has created an impact employees.

• LIMITATION OF THE STUDY

In order to carry out this research, the research was faced with a number of limitations. The greatest identifiable constraints are the following.

• Respondents: Here the workers were hesitant in giving out the information required of them partly because they saw it as an attempt to expose the inefficiencies in the system.
• Language: In this case, some of the employees are semi-literate and so do not really understand what was required of them similarly, they were also afraid of giving out information which they though might lead to their termination.
• Time: The time duration given to carry out research was too short as researcher needs the employees to be studied and re-studied before a final conclusion could be made. But in this case, it was not so because of time.
• Finance: This is another major impeding factor experienced by the researcher. No one can claim ignorance of the present economic depression prevalent in the country today. The price of virtually every commodity has embarrassingly gone up by abnormal percentage. The increase in transport fair and the price of writing materials.
• SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

The whole process of performance appraisal exercise involves reviewing the past to enable proper projection to be made of the future. The study therefore is as important for growth of this business organization. Business as we know cannot operate without employees and in order for organization to operate profitably, both employees and the employers must work with understanding and in satisfactory atmosphere so that one will not be seen as an obstacle to the other.

The study therefore will expose ways of reducing friction that may ensure between management and the union as well as managers and subordinates following the outcome of every appraisal exercise in order to usher in a peaceful industrial harmony in the organization.

The Alvan, the researchers employer will find the study particularly useful in human resource planning of the company. The study will also-serve as an insight for management on the proper use of performance evaluation on their subordinates.

Finally, the study can motivate the other interested researchers in this subject thereby giving them impetus to venture into a fresh field of study.

• DEFINITION OF TERMS

In order to achieve clarity and avoid misconceptions an attempt will be made here to define some terminologies used in this study.

1. MOTIVATION: This refers to the process of initiating and directing behaviour. An individual produces and sustains behavious when he/she finds it rewarding to do so; that is when the behaviour accomplishes an objective, which satisfies a need. As far as a big organization is concerned, an employee will be motivated to carry out the duties assigned to him to the extent to do so satisfy his or her personal needs.
2. SUPERIOR / RATES AND SUBORDINATES: The term Superior or refer is used to denote the person doing the appraising and the term subordinates is used to refer to the employee whose performance is being appraised. These terms do not imply that the person doing the appraising superior or rater is better than the subordinate or that the subordinate is inferior to the superior.
3. VALIDITY: this refers to the degree to which the measuring instruments measures as what it is intended to be measured. A valid performance appraisal system must specify performance criteria that are job related and import, as well as being easily determined through job analysis so that employees’ contributions to the organization can be evaluated based on the degree to which they perform those criteria and attains those results specified in the job analysis.
4. HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT: This is used to refer to all activities that are undertaken by organization to influence individual employees and the jobs they perform. The intention is to match the abilities and motivations of employees with the requirement and reward of the job.
5. Employee is a person who is hired to work for an employers
6. Employer is a person or organization that pays employee to work for them.