Assessing employees’ achievements and shortcomings—performance evaluation—can be a daunting task for managers and HR professionals. In addition to acknowledging and applauding achievements, performance evaluations force managers and HR professionals to confront employees about problems and issues. This requires a great deal of assertiveness, empathy, and tact but is ultimately very beneficial to the success of individual employees and organizations as a whole. Conducting performance assessments, communicating their results, and addressing problems and acknowledging successes helps employees meet expectations and take responsibility for self-improvement.
In this Discussion, you will examine three scenarios that will allow you to describe problems of performance and behavior. You also will assess the actions of the characters in the scenarios. Finally, you will formulate an HR strategy to address each case.
To prepare for this Discussion:
Review Chapter 9 of the Fallon and McConnell textbook. Focus on how performance appraisals are essential to the success and progress of employees within an organization.
Review Chapter 14 of the Fallon and McConnell textbook. Focus on the methods on handling employee problems of performance and problems of behavior.
Consider the following three cases:
Samuel Johnson subtly makes women feel uncomfortable when he moves around the office without overtly doing anything that would be considered sexual harassment. The behavior has increased in the last 3 weeks and has now carried over onto his female clients. This is affecting the work environment.
Christine Harrison wants to be taken seriously and is going a little too far to prove she is tough. Lately, she has been demeaning her coworkers. She attracts a lot of clients, but her tough exterior makes her less relatable. Other coworkers often need to calm her clients down.
Peter Fredrickson goes out to lunch and is consistently 5-10 minutes late getting back. He also only takes the preferred clients. He lets the newer coworkers deal with the lower profile clients.
Explain the behavior issues for your case.
Explain the performance issues related to your case.
Recommend an HR strategy to address the behavioral issues.
Recommend an HR strategy to address the performance issues.