Late Night Chapter 7 Summary Thinking

        In chapter 7, Evaluating Employee Performance, the correct procedures are talked about for how to correctly perform an employee performance evaluation. From determining a reason to perform one, if there are any environmental and/or cultural limitations, determining who will do the evaluation, and the best appraisal method to be used to obtain the desired goals of the organization. It discusses how to train raters, how they should observe and document employee behaviors and working conditions, then how they should take their information and evaluate. This chapter also explains the many different rating errors that can occur and the reasons that these errors may arise, their effects, and/ or how they can be solved. It then explains the best ways in which to explain to employees the results from the performance appraisal, critical incidents logs, and/or any other observations made by the supervisor. Finally, this chapter covers the best ways in which an organization and/or supervisor should handle a termination if it is needed and making sure that the legal aspect of any of these actions is done with fairness to avoid the potential possibility of a lawsuit by any employee.

        I do not think I have had more than a dozen performance appraisals over my work span, and I have been working since I was 15. I have worked for several different retail and food places most of which I did not stay at for very long because they were not the kind of job I wanted as my career and I when I found a better paying job I moved on. So, to some degree, I wasn’t at most of my jobs long enough to get a performance appraisal when I was much younger. The jobs I have gotten performance appraisals from did follow some of the guidelines stated but only loosely. They mostly went along the lines of..


~Hi


                         ~Hi


~Just wanted to let you know how you were doing so far.


                         ~OK


~You understand how to do the job, you understand what needs to be done and you get it done.


                          ~OK


~So, keep up the good work


                           ~OK


~Do you have any questions?


                           ~Nope, I’m good.


~OK, back to work.


                            ~OK


        Even at the postal service, its short and to the point. The postal service hardly ever does an evaluation. I think in the almost 8 yrs I’ve been there I have had maybe 3. They did observe my work and they had a sheet for it that they rated my performance on, I believe using the graphic rating scale, with a comments section, that usually said “keep up the good work”. They would hand me a copy afterward and that was that. Keep working.

        The only time they pulled me into the office for a sit down was after my son was born when I started missing more work than usual due to the hard time I had finding people to watch him. It was decided that I should move back to the night shift, so I did. My supervisor at the time was very nice, it was more like friends conversing than a boss and an employee and she listened to what I had going on and we thought of some solutions and night shift was the best and there was a bid up for it so that was what we decided I would try for.

        Not that I don’t think that companies out there don’t have and practice these policies that our textbook refers to, I just have never worked for those companies; or the supervisors that I have had, have never adhered to those policies. So I again don’t have a critical analysis, because what is there to analyze when the book is telling it straight forward how a company should, in a perfect world, handle any and all situations and circumstances. How a company can be and will be at its optimal. It’s kind of hard to critique what has already been critiqued to such a level that it made it into print as being the best way to accomplish a successful business.