The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of and the subjects' overall satisfaction with the implementation of an internally created performance appraisal system. The system was implemented at a major technology consulting firm in the US. The subjects of this study were manager level employees of the firm. An employee survey conducted annually at the firm included questions relating to the implementation of the performance appraisal system. Eight years of managers' responses to six key questions in the Career Development category were analyzed. Managers' perceptions of their contribution to the firm, their understanding of what career paths are available to them, their understanding of the requirements for promotion, as well as their overall satisfaction with the implementation of the performance appraisal system were captured by this survey. Trend analysis indicates that managers at the firm perceived their career path knowledge improved and their understanding of promotion criteria improved as a result of the implementation. Overall satisfaction with the implementation did not improve enough to site confidence in managers' perceptions for the period immediately after the implementation; managers' responses to the actual implementation were disagreeable to neutral. Managers did not feel their impact on the organization improved as a result of the implementation.

The aim of this study is to apply a power perspective upon textbooks used in the upper secondary school course of Swedish as a second language 3. Three different textbooks have been analysed from three perspectives regarding content, addressivity and activities. The analysis focuses firstly on to which extent and in which way the textbook authors connect language use on the basis of gender, social background and cultural belonging to aspects of power. Secondly, the ways in which the textbook authors invite pupils to negotiate about actualized conditions are examined. Ultimately, the balance between the four orientations constituting Janks (2010) interdependent framework for critical literacy education is described based on the textbooks’ tasks. The result shows that social background is prominent when two of the textbooks write about connections between language and power, whereas gender is assigned a marginalized position in all textbooks. The connections to power are mainly made by emphasizing the importance of mastering the dominant language, described as key to linguistic and cultural capital. The textbook authors often engage the pupil’s as well as external voices in their texts and rarely ascribe themselves roles of authorities. Regarding the framework for critical literacy, a problematic imbalance is caused by the lack of tasks that engage pupils in activities aiming to redesign their worlds in terms of social action.

Mini-dissertation submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF EDUCATION in the Department of Educational Management at the University of Zululand, 2010. / The purpose of this study was to determine the nature of development appraisal system and views of educators on the new model. Relevant literature was reviewed in order to determine the nature of development appraisal and to determine educator’s views on appraisals in developing countries. The subject of this study was 100 primary educators from primary and secondary schools in Bhekuzulu circuit in Vryheid district. The empirical investigation that was conducted revealed that a variety of appraisal models emphasized, amongst others that have been identified, teacher development as the main purpose of an appraisal. A positive attitude towards the implementation of appraisals and effectiveness in doing so realized the essence of goals of appraisal. The study revealed that appraisal can bring about renewal of classroom teaching, improve relationships with learners, and induce openness and sharing of ideas and problems. The empirical investigation revealed that most respondents have been appraised and that they realized the importance of this model. The following major findings emerged from the empirical investigation: Most educators had been appraised and that they realized the importance of developmental appraisal. In South Africa, development appraisal represented the paradigm shift away from traditional appraisal system. Development appraisals emphasise quality of education and assist in monitoring school objectives.

Studien syftar till att granska och belysa medarbetarsamtalets intentioner, praktiker och konsekvenser i svenska offentliga organisationer. Medarbetarsamtalet granskas utifrån hur det framställs i organisationernas dokumentation på olika nivåer i offentlig förvaltning. Då medarbetarsamtalet har kommit att tas alltmer för givet som ett inslag i det svenska arbetslivet, har vi eftersträvat en kritisk blick på fenomenet. Studiens fyra frågeställningar utgörs av: Vilken är den institutionaliserade formen för medarbetarsamtal utifrån dokumenten? Hur motiveras medarbetarsamtal i dokumenten? Vilka önskvärda ideal och vilken normering av synen på medarbetaren framkommer i medarbetarsamtalet? På vilket sätt kommer styrning och ledarskap till uttryck i samband med medarbetarsamtalet? Vid en översikt av litteraturen på området finns det studier som fokuserar på hur medarbetarsamtalet bäst utformas och gör som mest nytta. Det verkar här finnas ett antagande om att medarbetarsamtalet fyller olika viktiga syften för organisationen, chefen eller medarbetaren - bara det genomförs på rätt sätt. Det finns mindre beskrivet om andra outtalade syften med medarbetarsamtal och få studier som ifrågasätter om medarbetarsamtal, oavsett upplägg, är motiverade och efterfrågade i dess nuvarande institutionaliserade form. Studien finner flera likheter mellan organisationerna för medarbetarsamtalets upplägg, vilket tyder på en institutionaliserad form. Dessa likheter kan förklaras utifrån olika typer av isomorfism. Organisationerna anger olika syften med medarbetarsamtalen i sina interna dokument. Dessa uttalade syften kan vara särkopplade från ett underliggande syfte med samtalen som handlar om att uppnå legitimitet. Det finns motsägelser mellan de egenskaper som efterfrågas hos medarbetarna och strukturen för medarbetarsamtalen. Mallarna för medarbetarsamtalen kan användas för att avstyra medarbetare från att reflektera alltför djupt om sådant som ligger bortom de egna arbetsuppgifterna, vilket är kännetecknande för funktionell dumhet. / The focus of this study is the performance appraisal interview in the Swedish public sector. Using document analysis the study examines various policies related to performance appraisal from six different organisations. The aim is to describe the current institutionalised form of the appraisal interview and how this practice is justified according to the policies. Neo-institutional theory and the concept of functional stupidity is applied to analyse how the ideal employee is represented and the expressions of management in the documents. The results of the analysis show how isomorphism can be used to explain the similarities between the six organisations. The study also points to a potential decoupling of the expressed purpose of the interview and the unspoken intent of increased legitimacy. There are also discrepancies between the content of the policies and the practice of the interview. The templates for the appraisal interview can facilitate functional stupidity by using them to prevent employees from being too reflective.

No / There are problems in practice with dealing with inflation and exchange rate changes in the financial analysis of projects. This paper reviews existing procedures for dealing with changing prices, identifies problem areas and explains how they can be dealt with. The approach is manageable in its complexity, comprehensive in its coverage and consistent in so far as possible with both economic and accounting disciplines. It is illustrated with an example of a productive sector project with a ten-year life cycle.

Appraisers receive feedback from a variety of sources such as other appraisers, clients and the real estate market. Previous studies find client feedback to introduce an upward bias into commercial and residential appraisal judgments. Hansz and Diaz (2001) find that the provision of transaction price (market) feedback for a previously valued property biases commercial appraisers upwardly in subsequent valuations. The authors provide market optimism, client feedback and a reduced conservatism bias as explanations for their findings. However, previous client and market feedback studies were conducted in upward-trending or booming real estate markets. The identified upward bias in valuation judgments may have been the result of positive real estate market conditions. This study investigates the impact of transaction price feedback on residential appraisal judgment in a changed appraisal task environment, characterized by a depressed housing market, market pessimism, conservative lenders and a changed residential appraisal industry. As Hansz and Diaz (2001) find an upward appraisal bias in an upward-trending market, I expect market feedback to introduce a downward bias into residential appraisal judgments in a depressed market. Compared to a “no feedback” control group, residential appraisers receiving the feedback that their previous value estimates were too high, compared to the realized transaction price, are expected to make significantly lower subsequent value judgments for an unrelated property. The “too low” feedback is not expected to have an impact on subsequent value judgments. I test the hypotheses with a controlled experiment using a pre-posttest design. The experimental design has one factor (transaction price feedback) fixed at three different levels (“too low”, “too high”, “no feedback”). A posttest-only validity control group is added to test for a potential testing bias in the pre-posttest design. This study uses residential expert appraisers, defined as active Oregon State certified residential appraisers, from the Portland metropolitan statistical area (MSA) as subjects. Experimental subjects are randomly selected from a list of all certified residential appraisers in the Portland MSA. Experimental subjects are randomly assigned to the control and treatment groups (10 subjects per group; N=40). Subjects in the treatment groups and pre-posttest “no feedback” control group are asked to value a lot of vacant residential land in the geographically unfamiliar Roswell, Georgia. After they provide their value estimates for this first valuation case, subjects in the treatment groups are given a note from a seller’s broker stating the transaction price for the previously valued property. Subjects in the “too high” feedback group receive a transaction price that is 15% below their estimates and subjects in the “too low” feedback group receive a transaction price that is 15% above their value estimates. The control group receives no feedback. All treatment and control groups are then given a second (unrelated) valuation case of vacant residential land in Newnan, Georgia and asked for their value estimate. The experiment is concluded with an exit questionnaire containing demographic and professional questions as well as manipulation checks. The experimental data are analyzed using the parametric independent samples t-test. The assumptions of normality and equal variances are not violated by the dataset. A one-way ANOVA and the non-parametric Mann-Whitney U test are used as robustness checks. All statistical tests conclude that neither the mean of the “too high” feedback group nor the mean of the “too low” feedback group are statistically different at the 5% level from the mean of the “no feedback” control group. Thus, no evidence is found that transaction price feedback biases residential appraisal judgments in a depressed market. The insignificant results are further analyzed to assess whether they are due to a non-reception of the treatment by subjects, low statistical power or a non-existing relationship: The explanation that subjects did not read the treatment note can be excluded. A power analysis reveals low statistical power and very small effect sizes for both treatments. An alternative explanation for the insignificant results is the absence of the hypothesized relationship. The main client group of experimental subjects is appraisal management companies, which due to legislation passed after 2007, work with appraisers on behalf of lenders. As a consequence, residential appraisers do not receive direct client feedback anymore (compared to Hansz and Diaz, 2001) and may not respond subconsciously to the “too high” feedback.

The Master's Thesis is focused on the analysis of the employee performance appraisal system in the selected company. The aim of the thesis is to identify a strengths and weaknesses of the performance appraisal system and based on the discovered facts to suggest suitable solutions for increasing the efficiency of the evaluation system. The theoretical part deals with fundamental theoretical concepts and also with personal activities related to the employee performance appraisal. In the practical part is found out how the system of the employee performance appraisal is perceived through the questionnaire survey. Based on the survey results are identified shortcomings of the current system and proposed the measures for streamline the performance system.

This study provides a comprehensive look at the current state of best practices in performance appraisal systems in the public and private sector. From this, the main objective for this research paper is to investigate the reasons why INGOs are not currently able to properly implement a ‘best practices’ based performance appraisal system. Furthermore, this paper will provide both future research questions, as well as practitioner based recommendations. In addition, it will examine the need for higher levels of accountability in INGOs through appropriate performance appraisal systems.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / Supervisors are the primary drivers of performance management; however, little is known about factors that influence their implementation of these systems. The purpose of this study was to investigate how a supervisor individual difference—implicit person theory (IPT)—differentially predicts supervisor behaviors during, as well as both supervisor and employee reactions to appraisal interviews. In Study 1, MBA students reported their supervisors’ behaviors during their most recent performance appraisal interview (Time 1) as well as their subsequent reactions (i.e., perceived satisfaction, utility, success, supervisor support; Time 2). Their supervisors completed a measure assessing their own IPT (Time 3). Findings suggest that supervisors’ task-oriented behaviors predicted perceived satisfaction, utility, and success of the appraisal interviews, while supervisor’ relational-oriented behaviors predicted perceived supervisor support. In Study 2, supervisors recruited via MTurk completed all measures from Study 1 except perceived success. Results suggest that IPT was positively related to task-oriented behaviors and perceived utility, task-oriented behaviors mediated the relationship between IPT and all three reaction measures (i.e., perceived satisfaction, utility, and supervisor support), and relational-oriented behaviors significantly predicted supervisors’ perceived support. Overall, findings suggest that supervisors who believe people can change (hold a more incremental IPT) display more task-oriented behaviors during and see more utility in appraisal interviews. Additionally, task-oriented behaviors emerged as the key mechanism linking supervisors’ IPT and reactions to appraisal interviews. These findings demonstrate that supervisor individual differences, such as IPT, can influence performance appraisal and management outcomes.

The research study was conducted to investigate the effects of a performance appraisal system, rewards and self-efficacy beliefs in a utility company in South Africa. The study was motivated by the incessant challenges raised by employees against the way performance appraisal and rewards are conducted and awarded in the utility company. The scholarship that was consulted for this study included research articles, magazines, newspapers, company reports, books, citations from reputable sources and the Internet. These sources provided the arguments for and against the areas of a performance appraisal system, rewards and self-efficacy beliefs in the knowledge economy. A quantitative research methodology was used in this study where the questionnaire was the main data collection instrument. The quantitative research methodology was motivated by the nature and type of data collected, data collection instrument and the research paradigm. Data were collected from geographically dispersed locations and this would not have been possible to collect large volumes of data had an interview been used. The findings from the study were analysed and presented with the use of statistical packages. The findings were discussed and presented in chapter four of the study, where it was shown that performance appraisal systems were important in organisations as they create opportunities for the supervisor to know the weaknesses or strengths of his/her subordinates. Rewards were used as part of incentives to motivate employees to perform better. The study established that employees possessing high self-efficacy were bound to perform higher than those with low self-efficacy. The study established that there was a relationship between performance appraisals, rewards and self-efficacy. / MBA (Business Administration), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015