A STUDY

ON

METHODS OF PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL IN

RELIANCE COMMUNICATION

A Project Report submitted to

GALGOTIAS BUSINESS SCHOOL (AICTE)

Submitted By:
Isha Bajpai

Guided by

Professor
Dr. Pradeep Kulshreshtha

GALGOTIAS BUSINESS SCHOOL

Approved by (AICTE)
1, Knowledge Park, Phase II, Greater Noida-UP (INDIA), PINCODE 201306
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

This Project has been made possible through the direct and
indirect Co-operation of various persons, who have inspired
me at every step of my work. It is a matter of pride for me to
acknowledge my profound gratitude to all those persons.

I am highly obliged and thankful to my esteemed Project

Guide
Sir Satya N. Vegi and Internal Supervisor Dr. Pradeep
Kulshreshtha for his valuable Cooperation and Guidance.

Isha
Bajpai
 PREFACE

The research provides an opportunity to a student to

demonstrate application of his/her knowledge, skills and
competencies required during the technical session.
Research also helps the student to devote his/her skills to
analyze the problem to suggest alternative solutions, to
evaluate them and to provide feasible recommendations on
the provided data.

The research is on the topic “METHODS OF

PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL IN RELIANCE
COMMUNICATION”. Although I have tried my level best to
prepare this report an error free report and every effort has
been made to offer the most authentic report with accuracy.
 DECLARATION

I here by declare that the following documented Project Report titled

“METHODS OF PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL IN RELIANCE
COMMUNICATION” is an authentic work done by me.

The Study was undertaken as a part of the course curriculum of PGDM

full time Program of GALGOTIAS BUSINESS SCHOOL, Greater
Noida.

Isha
Bajpai
PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL
A formal system of review and evaluation of individual or team task
performance.
The history of performance appraisal is quite brief. Its roots in the early 20th
century can be traced to Taylor's pioneering Time and Motion studies. But this is
not very helpful, for the same may be said about almost everything in the field of
modern human resources management.The focus of performance appraisal in
most firms remain on the individual employee.Regardless of the emphasis, an
effective appraisal system evaluates accomplishments and initiates plans for
development, goals and objectives.
Performance appraisals are essential for the effective management and
evaluation of staff.Appraisals help develop individuals, improve organizational
performance , and feed into business planning. Formal performance appraisals
are generally conducted annually for all staff in the organization.Each staff
member is appraised by their line manager.Directors are appraised by the CEO,
who is appraised by the chairman or company owners ,depending on the size
and structure of the organization.

PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT

A management system consisting of all organizational processes

that determine how well employees,teams and ultimately ,the
organization perform.
The process includes HR planning, employee recruitment and selection,training
and development,career planning and development and compensation .
Performance appraisal is especially critical to its success .An organization must
have some means of assessing the level of individual and team performance in
order to make appropriate developmental plans.While performance appraisal is
but one component of performance management,it is vital in that it directly
reflects the organization’s strategic plans.

As emphasized before global competition affects virtually every American

business firm. For survival and success, it is imperative that these organizations
remain competitive in this environment. Organizations maintain continued
competition only through ceaseless development of human resources. Employee
performance appraisal is a potential mechanism for its growth.It is vital for
managers to realize that performance appraisal must be comprehensive and
that it is a continuous process; definitely not a periodic event.

OBJECTIVES OF PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL

• To review the performance of the employees over a given period of time.

• To judge the gap between the actual and the desired performance.

• To help the management in exercising organizational control.

• Helps to strengthen the relationship and communication between superior

– subordinates and management – employees.

• To diagnose the strengths and weaknesses of the individuals so as to

identify the training and development needs of the future.

• To provide feedback to the employees regarding their past performance.

• Provide information to assist in the other personal decisions in the

organization.

• Provide clarity of the expectations and responsibilities of the functions to

be performed by the employees.

• To judge the effectiveness of the other human resource functions of the

organization such as recruitment, selection, training and development.

• To reduce the grievances of the employees

FEATURES OF AN EFFECTIVE APPRAISAL

SYSTEM

Performance appraisal system should be effective as a number of crucial

decisions are made on the basis of score or rating given by the appraiser, which
in turn, is heavily based on the appraisal system. Appraisal system, to be
effective, should possess the following essential characteristics:
RELIABILITY AND VALIDITY:

Appraisal system should provide consistent, reliable and valid information and
data, which can be used to defend the organization – even in legal challenges. If
two appraisers are equally qualified and competent to appraise an employee with
the help of same appraisal technique, their ratings should agree with each other.
Then the technique satisfies the conditions of inter-rater reliability. Appraisals
must also satisfy the condition of validity by measuring what they are supposed
to measure. For example, if appraisal is made for potential of an employee for
promotion, it should supply the information and data relating to potentialities of
the employee to take up higher responsibilities and carry on activities at higher
level.

JOB RELATEDNESS:

The appraisal technique should measure the performance and provide

information in job related activities/areas.

STANDARDIZATION:

Appraisal forms, procedures, administration of techniques, ratings, etc., should

be standardized as appraisal decisions affect all employees of the group.

PRACTICAL VIABILITY:

The techniques should be practically viable to administer, possible to implement

and economical to undertake continuously.

LEGAL SANCTION:

Appraisals must meet the laws of the land. They must comply with provisions of
various acts relating to labor.

TRAINING TO APPRAISERS:

Because appraisal is important and sometimes difficult, it would be useful to

provide training to appraisers viz., some insights and ideas on rating,
documenting appraisals and conducting appraisal interviews. Familiarity with
rating errors can improve rater’s performance and this may inject the needed
confidence in appraisers to look into performance ratings more objectively.

OPEN COMMUNICATION:

Most employees want to know how well they are performing the job. A good
appraisal system provides the needed feedback on a continuing basis. The
appraisal interviews should permit both parties to learn about the gaps and
prepare themselves for future. To this end, managers should clearly explain their
performance expectations to their subordinates in advance of the appraisals
period. Once this is known, it becomes easy for employees to learn about the
yardsticks and, if possible, try to improve their performance in future.

EMPLOYEE ACCESS TO RESULTS:

Employees should know the rules of the game. They should receive adequate
feedback on their performance. If performance appraisals are meant for
improving employee performance, then withholding appraisal result would not
serve any purpose. Employees simply cannot perform better without having
access to this information. Permitting employees to review the results of their
appraisal allows them to detect any errors that may have been made. If they
disagree with the evaluation, they can even challenge the same through formal
channels.

DUE PROCESS:

It follows then that formal procedures should be developed to enable employees

who disagree with appraisal results (which are considered to be inaccurate or
unfair). They must have the means for pursuing their grievances and having
them addressed objectively.

Performance appraisal should be used primarily to develop employees as

valuable resources. Only then it would show promising results. When
management uses it as a whip or fails to understand its limitations, it fails. The
key is not which form or which method is used (Mathis and Jackson).

Performance appraisal TECHNIQUES

360- DEGREE FEEDBACK EVALUATION: A common approach to

assessing performance is to use a numerical or scalar rating system whereby
managers are asked to score an individual against a number of
objectives/attributes. Employees are also allowed the opportunity to assess the
person (manager) at the same time. This is known as 360° appraisal.
The biggest risk with 360 degree feedback is confidentiality. The information is
very sensitive and in the wrong hands ,could impact careers.
RATING SCALES:
A widely used appraisal method that rates employees according to defined
factors.The scale includes several categories ,normally five to seven in number,
defined by adjectives such as outstanding, meets expectations or needs
improvement.One reason for the popularity of the ratings scale method is its
simplicity, which permits quick evaluation of many employees.The factors chosen
for evaluation are typically of two types: job related and personal characteristics.
The rater (evaluator) completes the form by indicating the degree of each factor
that is most descriptive of the employee and his or her performance.Evaluators
total and then average the points in each part. Then they multiply this average by
a factor representing the weight given each section. The final score for the
employees is the total of each section’s points.

CRITICAL INCIDENTS:
A performance appraisal technique that requires a written record of
highly favourable and highly unfavourable employee work behaviour.
When such an action –a critical incident-affects the department significantly,
either positively or negatively, the manager writes it down .With this method , the
appraisal is more likely to cover the entire evaluation period and not focus on the
last few weeks or months.

ESSAY METHOD:
A performance appraisal method in which the rater writes a brief
narrative describing an employee’s performance.
Ratings of this type depend heavily on the evaluator’s ability. Supervisors with
excellent writing skills, if so inclined, can make a marginal worker sound like a
top performer. However, some managers believe that the essay method is not
only themost simple but also an acceptable approach to employee evaluation.

WORK STANDARDS:
A performance appraisal method that compares each employee’s
performance to a predetermined standard or expected level of output.
Several methods are available to determine work standards, including time study
and work sampling. An obvious advantage of using standards as appraisal
criteria is objectivity. However, in order for employees to perceive that the
standards are objective, they should understand clearly how the standards were
set. Management must also explain the rationale for any changes to the
standards.
RANKING:
A performance appraisal method in which the rater simply places
employees from a group in rank order of overall performance.
A difficulty occurs when individuals have performed at comparable levels (as
perceived by the evaluator). Paired comparison is a variation of the ranking
method in which the performance of each employee is compared with every
other employee in the group. Overall performance, is often the basis for the
comparison. The employee who receives the greatest number of favourable
comparisons receives the highest ranking.

FORCED DISTRIBUTION:
A performance appraisal method which requires the rater to assign
individuals in a work group to a limited number of categories similar to
a normal frequency distribution.
Because of slowing economy and an increased focus on pay for performance,
many firms have instituted some rankings or gotten tougher with their existing
systems. Proponents of forced distribution believe they facilitate budgeting and
guard against weak managers who are too timid to get rid of the poor performers.
They think that forced rankings require managers to be honest with workers
about how they are doing.

RESULT BASED SYSTEMS:

A performance appraisal method in which the manager and the
subordinate jointly agree on objectives of the next appraisal period.
Since organizations exist to achieve goals, a result-based system has obvious
value.A distinct advantage of this approach is that it provides a measure of
achievements against predetermined objectives.

BEHAVIORALLY ANCHORED RATING SCALES:

A performance appraisal method that combines elements of the

traditional rating scale and critical incident method.
BARS differs from rating scales because, instead of using adjectives at each
scale point, it uses behavioral anchors relate to the criterion being measured.
The approach facilitates discussion of the rating because it addresses specific
behaviours; thus overcoming weakness in other evaluation methods.
BENEFITS OF PERFORMANCE
APPRAISAL
Sharon Armstrong takes us through the benefits of conducting a downward performance
appraisal - the benefits to the organization, to the supervisor, and to the employee himself
or herself.

Organization Supervisor Employee

Communicates
Builds management skills Finds out how they’re doing
corporate goals

Provides management
with decision-making Develops and improves Provides recognition for
information on human rapport with employees accomplishments
resources

Provides objective
basis for raises, Allows for two-way
Identifies and rewards high
promotions, training, communication on goals and
performers
and other personnel performance
actions

Identifies performers Encourages taking

Builds stronger working
needing improvement for responsibility for their
relationships
coaching/training performance and progress

Improves overall Improves individual Helps set goals and direct

organizational productivity employee productivity efforts

Provides documentation for Identifies general training Provides opportunities for

inquiries on general needs career development and
promotion policies or improvement
individual claims of
discrimination

Demonstrates fairness to Assures fair individual

employees evaluations

Improves group morale