politics and performance appraisal

1. politics and performance appraisal
2. What political concerns do you think arise most in the performance review process? Why?

There is the most important political concern that arises during the performance appraisal review. One of them is self-promotion.   This is a way of seeking attention in the way of proving that one is capable and competent in doing the job. This has been significant in the performance appraisal, making most of the employees who receive the highest pay not being the top performers.  The nature of the work has challenged the employees spending less time with the employees, and thus they do not know the performance of the employees. The managers and supervisors will tend to give higher scores to the employees who self-promote themselves.   If an employee spends a significant amount of time telling the managers of how they are competent or how they are able to perform the job, and the manager does not meet the employees to know their actual performance, they will give the employee higher scores than the others.

The other political concern that rises during the review process is ingratiation, where subordinate’s employees give attention to senior employees in the workplace. They tend to show that their seniors are competent, and they are capable of doing the job. As a result of ingratiation, they received better reviews form the managers.   The managers had to rate them favorably as a result of the favor that they have given them.

Employees engage in this behavior so that they can be appraised positively by their managers. This increased their chances of being promoted or receiving higher pays a result of the higher rating.   This happens in response to organizational politics, where the employees perceive the appraisal process being skewed towards some employees.

2. Have you ever experienced a performance review process (either as a reviewer, reviewee, or observer) when it was clear that political concerns were impacting the process? If so, please describe the situation. If not, develop a hypothetical example (story) where this happens.

I have experienced a performance appraisal process that was flawed by politics.  This happened when the management had their preferred candidate for promotion.  Therefore, during the need for the hear performance appraisal, the candidate who was being eyed to take the position was reviewed positively, and this gave hymn an added advantage to rake the position.  This employee was known in the organization since he was always seeking power, and the manager frequently commented about him. Therefore, from the review process, it was expected that he would be favored in the review so that they could assume the position.

3. Provide some recommendations (evidence-based best practices) that the organization could use to reduce the likelihood of political concerns interfering with the performance appraisal process.

One of the struggles that can be used in mitigating the impact of politics during the performance appraisal is the use of 360-degree feedback.  This means that the rating form an individual rating constitutes only a fraction of the employees’ rating.  This means that favoring a person by rating them higher will have a reduced impact on the overall performance of the employees.

Another method of mitigating the impact of politics in performance appraisal is by codifying the procedures that are to be followed in the appraisal method.  This will allow for specific criteria to be followed, which can be evaluated for validity in the appraisal process. However, there should be no extreme formalization, which may result in a lot of bureaucracy hence leading to an iron cage.   However, there should be an established method of carrying out the appraisal process.

Another way of mitigating the impact of politics to make the appraisal system an ongoing process. This will eliminate the one-time rating in the year that is often affected by politics. Making it an ongoing process will mean that managers will have to focus on the performance of the employees regularly hence reducing the chances of inflation of their performance.