Abandoning Automated Appraisal Process? Yea or Nay?

If something in a company is broken, then it certainly needs to be fixed. But what if it is not?

The traditional employee performance evaluation is one where an employee receives an annual review from their manager, where they are scored in a variety of skill and knowledge areas.  Using these performance appraisal results, management can then plan for ways in which to motivate the employee, increase their skills and knowledge, and create a better workforce.

The feedback for a performance evaluation is primarily delivered and received in two distinct ways: formal and informal channels of communication.  Informal communication takes place on a regular basis and an example of this includes feedback on ongoing projects or tasks from a peer or a manager.  Although this informal communication is largely undocumented, it still makes a significant impact on how an employee perceives their performance.  However, undocumented communications mean that it is easily forgotten and missed out by the time the formal performance appraisal session rolls around.

Formal feedback is isolated to a company’s performance appraisal process, traditionally performed only once or twice a year.  How do employees maintain their motivation and job-related focus when they are only getting formal feedback once or twice a year?

Does this traditional approach effectively motivate employees, improve their performance and, in turn, produce better business results?

In small to medium-sized organizations, the smaller workforce (as compared to large MNCs) means that every single employee contributes a more significant impact to the performance of the business, and motivated employees are that much more valuable to their employer.  How would it impact the business if the small and medium-sized organizations abandoned the employee performance appraisal system as they currently know it?

All employees want to know how well they are doing in their roles and how their efforts impact everyone else around them.  People have a need to contribute and to have a purpose, so the idea of a performance management system does make sense.

The method and effectiveness of acquiring feedback have a direct correlation to an employee’s attitude and long-term success.  Just because a few large, international companies are walking away from the classic performance appraisal process does not mean that it is a good idea for smaller companies to do the same thing.  In fact, taking away the formal feedback session from the employee may have disastrous results for the future of the business, especially in small to medium-sized companies. We believe that most HR professionals would agree that the old way of doing the employee performance appraisal needs to change, but walking away from it altogether could be a huge mistake.  Change is a necessary part of the evolution of a business, but how it is managed directly to have an automated appraisal process with good effects on the outcome.

With the options available to change their traditional performance appraisal process, all companies would be wise to reconsider their available choices and decide if the automated appraisal process is here to stay or nay.

One of these choices is HRiQ^TM Human Capital Management Solution, a cutting-edge, robust performance management software that can introduce a much-needed change to the traditional process.

Imagine personalized, role-specific content that is automated with a tracking process that happens in real-time.  Automated mail reminders can also be set up to indicate when performance appraisal sessions and results are due. Managers involved in the formal performance evaluation process are no longer tied down by annual lengthy sessions and unnecessary paperwork and can record their evaluation feedback as and when necessary.

The software supports multiple performance appraisal methodologies and it can be set with customized weighted goals (to signify the importance of different skills/knowledge sets) assigned to each individual employee.

Being a well-integrated solution, the appraisal results can be sent to the payroll/compensation and benefits department, so bonuses, rewards, salary increments and other forms of employee motivation are calculated fairly based on appraisal results.

The integrated software can even take this data and turn it into better analytics for managers to evaluate an employee’s career progression so as to serve the business succession planning purposes.  All of this technology is a definite change from the traditional employee performance evaluation, and better yet, it offers improved value and return on investment.

IQ Dynamics offers this very product because we we see value in improving upon the current idea of the performance appraisal process and streamlining it into a newer and better approach to the performance appraisal process that is efficient, yet not intimidating to the employee.  We aspire to provide solutions to the most challenging issue that companies of all sizes are facing in today’s workplace: human capital management.

Of course, each individual company will have to weigh the pros and cons of keeping or scrapping their current performance management system and ultimately make a decision.  Some companies will choose to follow the trend of large companies and abandon the performance appraisal process. Other companies will choose to embrace technology such as HRiQ and completely upgrade their traditional processes and business expectations to have an automated appraisal process.