CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
Employee’s performance appraisal is one of the most critical functions of a leader/manager and is a basic expectation of anyone in a supervisory role. In many organization staff are being appraised to ascertain how much each person contributed to the achievement of corporate goals and objectives. The major objectives are usually profit maximization and service delivery. Performance Appraisal System has been found to act as strong and indispensable Machinery for increase in organizational productivity, organizational peace and harmony and organizational position in its environment Brown, M., J.S. Heywood (2005:43).
According to Schoenfeld and Shaw (1996) “the evaluation of performance is the control mechanism that provides not only feedback to individuals but also an organization assessment of how things are progressing. Without performance information, managers of the organization can only quess as to whether employees are working towards the right goals, in the correct way and to the desired standard. Performance Appraisal according to then is a means of knowing if employee behaviour is consistent with the overall strategic focus and a way for bringing to the fore any negative consequences of the strategy behavior link” Kuvaas, B. (2006:17).
In their own view Hicks and Gullet (1973 states that “all persons in organization have personal objectives and each person expects that participation in the organization will help him achieve his personal objectives.
Therefore performance appraisal becomes a means of aligning the objectives of the individual employees with the organizational objectives. According to Frankline (2003), there are several reasons for performance appraisal exercise they are to:
To provide feedback to the employee, To clarify job expectations, To determine training needs, To diagnose performance problems and Merit pay or salary adjustment.
Other reasons for performance appraisal according to Akpata (2001) are to provide feedback to the supervisor and input for administrative decisions i.e. promotion, tenure, future employment etc.
According to Ubeku (1984:188) “performance appraisal is basically concerned with a review of individual performance during a set period to identify his area of strength and weakness and establish targets for him to achieve within the overall corporate objectives of the organization.
Moreover Nwachukwu (1988:165) stakes that performance appraisal is the determination of how effective an individual has performed the job for which he was hired. In many cases any one can aptly say that performance appraisal is a periodic and systematic assessment of the work, a compliment of an employee either by himself or his superior in other to impact his effectiveness and adequacy on the job.
Performance appraisal is one of the management tools designed to achieve organizational objectives contributing to the subject matter. Orugbo (1978:24-25) states that individuals in an organization have their own objectives which they hope to achieve through the organization, hence their reason for their placing much reliance or being effectively appraised.
However, Khan (2006) warnes that an ineffective performance appraisal can seal the fate of an organization by creating chaos and confusion from top to bottom in the administrative hierarchy. As a consequence, the chances of success and growth of that organization are bleak.
A Survey by Cleveland et al (1989) shows that performance appraisal has the greatest impact on salary administration, performance feedback and identification of strengths and weakens. However, the impact of appraisal on employee overall performance it yet to be empirically studied.
In keystone Bank Nigeria Limited each staff is appraised to highlight the members good performance and also mention some areas where they have not fared well. The training needs of the staff member’s are also identified. The fact that personnel are to be appraised makes then work very hard.
Staff that are rated highly in Keystone Bank Ltd are given staff an edge over others in terms of promotion. Those that do not measure up during appraisal exercise often not promoted. They are also not placed to work in places that need high intelligence e.g. credit and marketing department.
Management in organizations generally agrees that one of the key factors in developing a smooth functional and efficient firm is the full utilization of its human resources.
Management of workforce is not different from other areas of operation, expect that while other key areas of operation focus on issues like machinery or finance, human resource focus on the most important resources of business the personnel.
The performance management-process is thus an integrated concern that helps to ensure that employees are aware of what is expected of them and how their contribution fits into the big picture as follows:
- Have been involved in establishing the objectives they are required to achieve.
- Understand how their performance is to be measured and can tract how well they are doing.
- Receive appropriate support and coaching throughout the period.
- Are given appropriate recognition and reward for their achievement.
Performance appraisal is one step in developmental sequence for strengthening the total organization. It is a crucial step which unfortunately has often been carried out with achieving little or no success. It is against this attitude of indifference background that the study intends to examine the attitude of staff towards performance appraisal in keystone bank limited.
1.2 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
These problems are: