Performance Appraisal Overload: How Do You Keep Managers Engaged in Large Organizations?

Generally, performance appraisal forms are lengthy and time-consuming. In such cases, if a manager is asked to fill out 100 forms, they may lose interest in completing them and delegate the task to their assistant. I am seeking a solution to this issue as I am part of a fairly large organization and am concerned about it. Seniors, please address this concern.

Regards

Hi Swati,

Even I feel so tired filling up PMS forms for my team. Shortening the form depends on the type of appraisal method you are using. We have a very simple method, and I will tell you what I did to shorten it.

See if there are any points or attributes that are redundant in your forms under different heads and names. For example, judging a person on time management and attendance/late comings is almost the same thing, so you can delete attendance/late comings.

See if you can change all the attributes and feedback to just a point-wise pattern. For each attribute that you want to measure, you can have points on a scale of 1 to 10 so that the manager doesn't have to write stories.

One more trick I used in my organization which actually worked well was to print the form on both sides of the paper. It makes the form look smaller. But as I said, it depends on the kind of appraisal method you have.

Regards,
Deepthi

Dear Swati,

PMS exercises are often lengthy, and shortening them could really affect their utility. The only thing we can do is to make them interesting and try to innovate the key items of the appraisal format in a new way. For example, orthodox target-based appraisals could be modified by assigning variable attributes to the marking and converting it into a percentile form rather than simply allocating marks.

Thanks and regards,
Jayendra Chaturvedi

To Jayendra Chaturvedi,

I think this makes sense to me. But can you please explain the same in detail? I'll be obliged.

Regards

Dear Swathi,

Performance Appraisal (PA) is always a lengthy process to complete within a short timeframe. Firstly, Swathi, you need to establish a clear scale of the people for whom the manager has to conduct the appraisal, ensuring that each manager is responsible for appraising no more than 10 individuals. By doing this, the manager will not feel overwhelmed by the task of filling out appraisal forms and other related activities. It is advisable to involve team leaders in the appraisal process and have them provide ratings that the manager can review. If there are any discrepancies in the ratings, the manager can then step in to address the issue.

This is my suggestion for you.

Regards

Dear Swati,

Could you please clarify the appraisal process adopted by you so that I can suggest the kind of changes we can make in the process?

My email address is jayendra_manish@yahoo.co.uk.

Thanks and regards,
Jayendra Chaturvedi

Dear Swati,

A lot of good points have been raised by seniors and are worth considering.

Here is one more. It will involve a little more administrative work on the part of the HR department, but it has worked in other companies. Say if a manager has 20 appraisals to make, divide the appraisals so that a candidate who has joined in May will get his appraisal done every May.

This will greatly reduce the number of appraisals a month that the manager has to make. If more than three appraisals happen to be in a particular month, then the excess can be adjusted in preceding/succeeding months.

Keep the completed appraisals in a pending file, and just a fortnight before the annual salary review, ask the manager to quickly review these and confirm that his appraisal still stands. If he feels there has been a subsequent change in behavior/productivity, he can state so and amend his overall comments. This will take very little time and can be done by the manager whenever he has some free time during that fortnight.

See if this could help.

Jeroo