RATERS ERRORS IN PERFORMANCE

NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF MODERN LANGUAGE Name: Nida Gondal Class: be (se)-viii Submitted to: Sir col.Sial Assignment no: 01

Since we are all human, it is common for us to make errors when assessing employee behavior and writing performance appraisal documents. These errors are reflective of our unconscious biases toward the employee. These biases can give an employee an unfair advantage or disadvantage over others in their peer group. A barrier to the accuracy and credibility of performance measures is posed by a number of rater errors, perceptual biases and other sources of distortion in performance ratings. Questions that are to be ask while evaluating performance: Am I basing my rating on documentation of my observations of the Employees behavior, or am I making judgments based on my perceptions? Am I looking at each of this Employees competencies separately, or have I generalized about his or her performance? Have I looked at this Employees competencies over time, or have I generalized according to initial perceptions of her or him? Have I recognized any biases I may have so I do not let them influence my judgments? Have I rated this Employee on his or her actual behavior or have I rated her or him compared to other individuals?

RATER ERRORS IN PERFORMANCE:

HALO EFFECT: Halo Effect is when a raters overall positive or negative impression of an individual employee leads to rating him or her same across all rating dimensions. This is when a manager really likes or dislikes an employee and allows their personal feelings about this employee to influence their performance ratings of them. LIENIENCY ERROR: Leniency error is when a raters tendency is to rate all employees at the positive end of the scale (positive leniency) or at the low end of the scale (negative leniency). This can happen when a manager over-emphasizes either positive or negative behaviors. CENTRAL TENDENCY ERROR: Central tendency error is the raters tendency to avoid making extreme judgments of employee performance resulting in rating all employees in the middle part of a scale. This can happen either when a manager is not comfortable with conflict and avoids low marks to avoid dealing with behavioral issues or when a manager intentionally forces all employees to the middle of the scale. RECENCY ERROR:

Recency error is the raters tendency to allow more recent incidents (either effective or ineffective) of employee behavior to carry too much weight in evaluation of performance over an entire rating period. This can be extreme on both ends of the spectrum. Either an employee just finishing a major project successfully or an employee may have had a negative incident right before the performance appraisal process and it is on the forefront of the managers thoughts about that employee. It is for this reason that keeping accurate records of performance throughout the year to refer back to during performance appraisal time is so important.

FIRST IMPREESION ERROR: First impression error is the raters tendency to let their first impression of an employees performance carries too much weight in evaluation of performance over an entire rating period. An example of this would be a new employee joining the organization and performing at high levels during their honeymoon period and then possibly losing some of that initial momentum. SIMILAR-TO-ME ERRORS: Similar-to-me error is when the raters tendency is biased in performance evaluation toward those employees seen as similar to the raters themselves. We can all relate to people who are like us but cannot let our ability to relate to someone influence our rating of their employee performance.

Since human biases can easily influence the rating process, it is important to create objective measures for rating performance. Observing behaviors and using available technology to help track performance can take some of the biases out of the rating process.

When thinking about performance appraisals, it is essential to look at the rater. If performance appraisals are to be helpful, they must be accurate. When a manager is subject to one of the rater errors, the rating is not a clear indication of the employees performance. Therefore, training raters to consider these rating errors may help to eliminate inaccurate performance appraisals.

Stereotyping
Stereotyping is the tendency to apply the same generalizations to all members of specific social groups. One of the more common types of stereotyping that occur in the workplace is gender stereotyping. Research conducted by Madeline Heilman, a professor of psychology at NYU, suggests that women are often evaluated more negatively than men, even when both are trained to do a job the same way.