Standard for Performance Appraisals Performance Essay

Personnel record

Personnel records are data pertaining to employees which consist of factual and comprehensive information of employee. All employee information is kept in systematic order which assists human resources manager to make an effective decision about employee. Typically, personnel records consist of employee past records, medical report and employee progress. Personnel record also consist of payroll records, leave records, and benefit record and turnover record. Training and development record contains training schedule, transfer cases, and appraisal reports. Health and safety record contains medical history, safety provisions, sickness reports, and insurance reports. The service record contains essential records that consist of bio-data, family information, residential information, and marital status, academic qualifications, past address and employment records. While some critics argue that personnel records is a waste of time and money, however, Yoder (1942) provides several benefits that organization could derive from personnel record:

Personnel record assists managers to identify crucial information regarding employees.

Personnel record also assists managers to make decision regarding employee training, and development program, allowances, salary revisions, and other benefits related to personnel salaries.

More importantly, it assists government organization to collect information about employee turnover and rate of absenteeism.

Thus, personnel records are not wasteful resources and rather vital to an organization.

Monitoring and Investigation of Employees

In a contemporary business environment, electronic performance monitoring (EPM) has become a process where organizations use electronic computer or other non-human methods to monitor employee performances. In the last 20 years, organizations using electronic monitoring to monitor the performance of employee have increased drastically. By 1990, one-third of employee in the United States was being monitored electronically. By 2001, about 78% of employees were monitored electronically, and in 2010, the number of employees being monitored electronically increased.One of the reasons for using electronic monitoring is that it enhances organizational productivity. Typically, EPM assists management to understand whether employee are actually working or doing other personal things during working hours. However, there are some criticisms against electronic monitoring on the basis of ethical issue, the questions are raised whether organizations have the right to monitor employee electronically. There are also issues of legal concern on whether employers are violating employee privacy using EPM. Despite the criticisms against EPM, the electronic monitoring has been revealed to increase productivity since organization needs to maximize productivity to achieve organization performances. However, organization still needs to be very careful on how they implement EPM because of the legal issue.

Conclusion

The paper addresses the issue of performance standard and performance appraisal practice. With the increase in the global competitions, organizations will continue to implement performance standard to enhance employee performances. However, organizations still need to abide by different aspects of employment laws to guide against the legal issues that might have arisen with the implementation of the performance standard and performance appraisal process.

References

Ahmed, S. (2005).Analysis of Workplace Surveillance in a Quest for Ethical Stance. Journal of Business Systems Governance and Ethics .2(4).

American Bar Association.(2001).Employment: Proof of Discrimination. Mental and Physical Disability Law Reporter. 25( 5): 826-831.

Aswathapp, K. (2005).Human Resource and Personnel Management. (4th Edition) Tata McGraw-Hill Education.

Aswathapp, K (2010). Employment Law for Human Resource Practice. Tata McGraw-Hill Education.

General Performance Appraisal System (GPAS) Privacy Act . Federal Register. 64(107) Friday, June 4, 1999 / Notices

Rao, T.V.(2004). Performance Management and Appraisal Systems. HR Tools for Global Competitiveness. SAGE Publications Pvt. Ltd.….....