Employee Performance Management - Essay Example

EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT In today's volatile environment, an organization's employees are considered as one of the most important assets that the company possesses. The human resource existing in an organization is so important that specific departments are now established in all multinationals and organizations across the world to facilitate the flow of proper human resource in the organization. Emphasis is paid on training and appraisals in order to motivate the employees so that they may be able to deliver the best to the organization. The world has now realized the importance of a satisfied and motivated employee at work and they no longer dwell in the historical practices of aristocracy in the organizations. The situation has not been this way for a long time; until the last century, their existed an autocratic organizational system where the word of the top management was considered the last word. Their existed an environment where no emphasis was paid on the rights on employees and their needs. In order to properly defend the statement, one needs to look into the reasons for these developments that have been mentioned in the statement. Post-modernism is a concept that is deep rooted in history and is one of the fundamental reasons of the development of the recent organizational structures, bureaucratic environments and empowered employees. A discussion regarding how modernism started would first require understanding what existed in the pre-modernist era. HISTORY & POST MODERNISM The need for post modernism has been rooted deep in the history of mankind. It was first used in 1914 to describe the changing mindsets of people against the society prevailing at that time. Then came in modernism which gave people an escape from the normality and let people question their beliefs and creativity was fostered. However, it gave rise to modernity or bureaucracy. Bureaucracy usually uses rules and guided procedures in order to accomplish their tasks and depend on the predictability of events. They give no space to the unpredictably of life. In management terms, this would mean that there is task continuity prevalent in organization practicing bureaucracy and people would be subjected to strict rules and norms, repeated preprogrammed tasks and would be provided with stable and probable environments where homogeneity exists between the goods and services offered. Post modernism was a reaction to the modernistic ideas. Post-modernism largely is defined by the age in which there was intellectual growth, cultural enhancement, and development of an artistic state without the boundaries and restrictions of the hierarchies( Frederick, 1984). Post modernism stated that there are no clear cut and defined lines to a central successful organizational principle. It negated the aristocratic or the central hierarchy system and paved way for a more people oriented idea to organization development. Development of post-modernism was a result of the changing times and environment as well. It helped in almost all the disciplines of modern era. Post-modernistic ideas helped in the development of architecture, law, culture and literature. It heavily influenced the marketing and management fields of science as well. The management scenario changed completely with the advent of this idea in the society (Tim, 1999). The main focus would be kept over management and marketing practices because of the topic at hand. Post-modernism can be best explained as an era where nothing is certain and nothing is impossible. There are endless possibilities waiting to be grasped and countless situations in which a man can find himself. However, it has its share of criticism as being meaningless when it came to evaluating mathematical structures. Many people also argue that the era we are living right now is the post-postmodern condition. GLOBALIZATION Globalization is another important factor that gave rise to the post-modern conditions of today. Globalization by definition is turning personalized or localized phenomena's into global ones. Globalization relates to thinking the whole world as one and working out strategies according to this thinking. It is the integration of national level economies into internationally integrated economic structures by the help of capital flows, direct investment etc. The roots for globalization had been set up during the 'Age of discovery' which gave rise to the trade across the waters, across nations, development of a societal structure and colonization. Globalization is considered to be a process that took place over centuries. Globalization has set to have huge impacts on cultures; they are better defined according to the regions and societies, however, they are now integrating into one common culture especially when it comes to workplace environments. Globalization has affected the world financially, ecologically-as more and more challenges are impossible to be catered too without international cooperation, informational requirements are increasing, politically and economically. POST-BUREAUCRATIC MODALITIES As the world is becoming a global village, it is triggering the need of proper and timely informational flow as highly important. With more and more people associated with the risks of business due to share of risks with the help of public holdings of share which in turn was another trigger for globalization, people now want the management to make more informed decisions and the organizations need to make profits. To improve the efficiency of organizations, more emphasis is now paid on employees and their satisfaction during the work. As people are becoming more informed about the world and the way things are turning up, they now understand the importance human capital has for an organization. It would be very easy for organizations to efficiently increase production with the help of machinery and technology but the pure drivers of this efficient machinery and technology are mere people. As society is becoming people-oriented, a welfare society, people are recognizing their rights and needs and working accordingly. Also, as there is scarcity of good labor in the market that can provide you with the edge you need in today's globalized economies where technology is with everybody; however, human capital differentiates and becomes the basis of the competitive advantage. In order to acquire the right labor, organizations are now striving to maintain harmony and co-existence between the needs and wants of the organization and the people who are working for the organization, thus leading to proper human resource management departments. HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT AND ITS LINK TO POST-MODERNISM Human Resource is becoming important and important to organizations day by day. Share holders want the best for their organization in terms of technology, raw materials or conditions. Human force or labor can bring knowledge within the organization that can provide you with the competitive edge. In this every changing world, where there is a need for timely and proper availability of information, employees are becoming more important because they bring in something intangible to the organization that maybe the only thing that could take you to the height of success. It has been realized that dynasties have been broken down by the will power and the power of the man; it is not being utilized to the maximum extent in organizations by implementing human resource management practices and modules that help in the management of human capital (Raymond, 1999). Human resource by definition is the strategic approach taken for the management of an organization's biggest and the most important assets- people. These are the people who work together in order to attain the goals for the organization. This term has replaced the term personal management from the books and its domain is evolving rapidly. The theoretical assumption are basically giving importance to the needs and wants of the employee; considering each employee as an individual with separate qualities and varying goals and requirements. It is a people oriented approach that assumes that all the individuals want to work for the profit of the organization but they only fail to do so either because of lack of understanding, communication, training or failures of the procedures that are being practiced in the organization. The main goal of human resource management these days is considered to be that of attracting, maintaining and managing employees in a workplace who can work in harmony to reach goals for the organization (Richards, 1998). The rapid development of human resource management over the last century is positively attributed to the development of post-modernism and the related ideas. It is because of the changes that took place in the mind set of the people, after the World War II that has prompted this human-oriented approach towards organizational development. It has been successfully debated that human resource management has been a way to successfully move from the modernistic view of employees which considers mans as machines; towards are more post-modernistic view that considers employees as individuals. It was recognized with the development of this theory that a human is a complex being and is definitely not a machine. The traditional hierarchical approaches were negated due to the effects of the World War and slowly, organizations became more flexible, started providing employees with a culture which was in cognition with the organization goals and started focusing on the people as being the most important resource. There are various theories pertaining to human resource management that help us to identify the fact that human resource management that incorporates employee performance management is a result of post bureaucratic environment that was entailing the world half a century ago due to post modernism and globalization (John, 2001). These two theories are basically the academic theory and a critical development of the same theory known as the critical academic theory. Both these theories are heavily inspired by the ideas of post modernism, further proving that the field of human resources has developed due to the developments in the ideas of post-modernism. The Academic theory is basically changing the idea about man that used to be present in times of modernism. It was thought that man worked as a machine with ideal working conditions and thinking abilities. He was thought to be somebody who could deliver 100% efficiency. This idea was changed with the help of this theory and man was not considered a machine, and therefore, the academic theory pertains to have a disciplinary overlook above the people working in the organization. The critical academic theory heavily draws from most-modernism and critics changed the idea of a man from a machine to that of an individual with different working capabilities in different domains, with the working conditions and thinking abilities to be limited according to the limited cognitive processing. The critics went on to recognize the humanity of the human resource and worked more an attitude shaping of the individual that might work for the organization that keeping a strict control over them. Human resource management incorporates various disciples such as hiring, recruitment, selection, testing, training of the individuals, development of appraisal systems etc. As the idea of human resources is constantly evolving, the human resource function now incorporates the sustaining of employees in the organization as a fundamental part because the companies now want to sustain the much needed human resource working in their organization. Employee performance management is one of the fundamental parts of human resource management. It comes under the duties of the human resource management function to sustain and maintain high empowered employees in the organization (Robert, 2006). PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT AS A PART OF HUMAN RESOURCE Performance management basically involves that the goals of the organization match that of the individual are both are being effectively and efficiently met. Basically, the employee performance management process incorporates the development of the goals and standards that are needed to be met, performance plans are established. Since, people are considered as individuals, each one of them is dealt with individual care and motivation is done with the help of using various motivational theories. One can motivate employees by developing job design structure according to the capabilities of the employee, an environment in which he or she can grow. Post-modernistic ideas relate to the fact that individuals should be informed about the goals that they are required to be met and should be provided with an environment in which they can work to achieve those goals. Equity theory states that motivation is function of development of equity in rewarding the employees according to their performances. Goal setting is an important aspect that is used to motivate employees in organizations which is directly related to the concept of post-modernism. In goal setting, goals are directly linked with rewards which are perceived to have importance for the employee working in the organization. Performance feedback in the form of appraisal is also an important part of the process as this is the process that informs the employee as to where he stands and motivates him to work harder and achieve the goals. The next step in performance management comes in while evaluating performance problems. In order to grasp the shortcomings of the performance management programs that are working in the organization, companies realize the performance gap that is present between the expected and the achieved performance towards goals by the employees. Resolving conflict in critical situations, understanding needs of individual employees and realizing the differences present in the needs of the employees is very important as this helps the management to channelize the goals and rewards in such a way that it helps to extract the best performance from them. For example, employee A might be motivated to work harder for intrinsic rewards such are praise from the boss and good will in the economy, whereas the others would want pay raise to meet the performance that is required by the management. This implies that people have different needs that need to be catered to be motivated enough to work to the fullest. Hence, the idea of human resource and employee motivation is individualistic; the human resource management needs to understand the underlying needs of the employees and work accordingly so that goals can be achieved. The idea of post-modernism as considering man as an individual can be seen explicitly applied in this field of social science; considering man as an individual and work according to the needs of the individual. VOLATILE ENVIRONMENT AS A DRIVER FOR CULTURE MANAGEMENT As mentioned earlier, bureaucratic organizations used the assumption of complete predictability in order to function and depended on the set pattern of organizational structure with strict control over the processes of the organization. However, with the passage of time, the environment entailing the socio-economic conditions of the whole world is changing. As advancements in technology are increasing, so are the methods of communications, production processes are becoming more efficient, changes are taking place more rapidly than ever. All these drivers result in a situation of uncertainty in the world. In this situation of uncertainty, another factor that has forced the change in the modern methods of management is the development of large complex organization. The Dutch East India Company was one of the biggest drivers of globalization. In the development of this company, the risk was huge and this risk was delegated to the public by issuing shares for the first time, thus resulting in formation of globalized companies working in more than one country, discounting the presence of geographical and political boundaries present between countries. As organizations today are becoming more complex, with more and more risks involved, and people from diverse backgrounds all working together for a common goal; it is now considered important to cater to the social, physical and other needs of these employees as they all are working of a common purpose. As bureaucratic method cannot effectively work to handle such large and complex organizations, there was a need felt to move towards more flexibility and hence came the post-bureaucratic organization model which is more devoid of layers, and fosters on the development of sound communication and high trust. In this kind of uncertain environment, it is mandatory to realize the importance of an individual's contribution towards the organization and to make him a part of the process, hence providing them with a responsibility so that he may feel the need of working towards the common goal. Individuals are now required to take responsibility for their individual actions and high discretion decisions are asked to be taken by them. Leadership plays an important role in developing employee performance and motivation in today's organization. However, the leadership capabilities are now more directed towards being as charismatic and not rational. Leaders are expected to ooze self confidence and to be able to motivate employees by their personality and thoughts. This is so because, as uncertainty has increased in the air, nobody can be sure of what the future holds for us. In this case, a person cannot base their persuasion on rationality but they can motivate employees to work with their charisma. (Edgar, 1992) CULTURE DEVELOPMENT THROUGH HUMAN RESOURCES Environment in which the individuals are asked to work is a high motivator for many. With lots more at stake in today's organization, it is required that the culture that is prevalent in an organization is in line with the kind of environment they are present in. In volatile environments, where risks associated and uncertainty is high, flexible cultures are more prevalent and successful. Individuals get to choose the best way in their opinion, they are allowed to take chances and feel a sense of responsibility on their shoulders which helps them to deliver the best. However, in stagnant environments, bureaucratic organizations work better. Cultures help to provide a regulating medium, a language pertaining to the organization, a voice to the organization (Martin, 2000). It helps in integrating the different people into one common workplace and helps them to work for a common goal. If there is lack of a common culture prevalent, it is difficult for individuals to relate to the certain organization, which can divert their goal attention towards something else. Therefore, culture forms an important part of helping the organization achieve the goals through employee's relative relatedness with the organization in an air of uncertainty (Daniel, 1997). Human resource management is now faced with this challenge, to incorporate such a culture in the organization that holds the organizational human resource together. A culture is made by the help of the people who execute it. So, in order to make a culture prevalent in an organization, people are required to practice the norms of that culture. With changing environmental and socio-economical landscapes and with such a diverse workforce present in organizations, it is becoming an important task of the human resource management portals to manage the cultural changes in the organization to map it according to the changes that are taking place in the organization. This can help the organization and its man power to cope up with uncertainty and develop a sense of belongingness. CONCLUSION The above discussion greatly agrees with the statement that was critically examined. Globalization has been one of the drivers of the flexible environment that is present in the world today and has forced employee motivation as the importance of man has increased in the society. Also, in the volatile environment that is now present in the world, it is becoming important for the organizations to counteract it with the help of a sound culture developed in the organizations. This cannot be achieved without the help of the human resource that is present in the organization as it is the very man who makes the culture. References Robert L Mathis, John Harold Jackson (2006). Human Resource Management. Thomson South-Western Wayne Mondy, Judy Bandy Mondy, Robert M Noe (2007). Human Resource Management. Prentice Hall. John Bratton, Jeffery Gold, Bratton (2001). Human Resource Management: Theory and Practice. Routledge. Richard Symonds Williams (1998). Performance Management: Perspective of Employee Performance. International Thompson Business Press. Elizabeth C Pope (2004). HR How-to-Performance Management: Everything that you need to know. CCH Incorporated. Raymond A Noe, J Hollenbeck, B Gerhart, P Wrigh (1999). Human Resource Management: Gaining a competitive Advantage. McGraw Hill. Andrew E Shwartz, Deborah Zemke (1999). Performance Management Frederic Jameson (1984). The post modern condition: a report on Knowledge. University of Minnesota Press. Tim Woods (1999). Beginning Post-modernism. Manchester University Press. Edgar H Schien (1992). Organizational Culture and Leadership: a dynamic Overview. Jossey-Bass. Martin Parker (2000). Organizational culture and identity: Unity and Division at work. SAGE Daniel R Denison (1997). Corporate Culture and Organizational Effectiveness. Read More