What is true about the paired comparison method of measuring employees performance?

Human Resource Management, 15e (Dessler)

Chapter 9 Performance Management and Appraisal

1) Which of the following terms refers to the process of evaluating an employee's current and/or

past performance relative to his or her performance standards?

A) employee selection

B) performance appraisal

C) employee orientation

D) organizational development

Answer: B

Explanation: B) Performance appraisal means evaluating an employee's current and/or past

performance relative to his or her performance standards. Performance appraisal always involves

setting work standards, assessing the employee's actual performance relative to those standards,

and providing feedback to the employee.

2) The primary purpose of providing employees with feedback during a performance appraisal is

to motivate employees to ________.

A) apply for managerial positions

B) remove any performance deficiencies

C) revise their performance standards

D) enroll in work-related training programs

Answer: B

Explanation: B) The purpose of providing feedback to the employee is to motivate him or her to

eliminate performance deficiencies or to continue to perform above par.

3) Which of the following is NOT one of the recommended guidelines for setting effective

employee goals?

A) creating specific goals

B) assigning measurable goals

C) administering consequences for failure to meet goals

D) encouraging employees to participate in setting goals

Answer: C

Explanation: C) Effective goals should be specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and timely.

Goals should be challenging but doable, and employee participation should be encouraged.

Giving consequences for failing to meet goals is not recommended and unlikely to motivate

employees.

4) SMART goals are best described as ________.

A) specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and timely

B) straightforward, meaningful, accessible, real, and tested

C) strategic, moderate, achievable, relevant, and timely

D) supportive, meaningful, attainable, real, and timely

Answer: A

Explanation: A) The acronym SMART stands for specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and

timely.

5) All of the following are reasons for appraising an employee's performance EXCEPT________.

A) correcting any work-related deficiencies

B) creating an organizational strategy map

C) determining appropriate salary and bonuses

D) making decisions about promotions

Answer: B

Employee appraisal systems help managers evaluate employee job performance and develop a fair system of pay increases and promotions. Appraisals in turn can help staff members improve performance, and assist companies in devising or reorganizing job functions to better fit the position or the employee. In addition, employee appraisals may reveal outdated or inefficient business practices. Effective employee appraisal systems incorporate goals to help improve the employer as well as the employee, through the application of appropriate and timely feedback and training.

Trait-Focused Performance Appraisal

The trait-focused system centers on attributes such as helpfulness, dependability and punctuality. Supervisors rate employees by indicating specific traits each employee exhibits. Most trait-focused systems use a simple checklist with ratings of excellent, satisfactory or needs improvement, or similar options. This system is traditionally popular with customer service departments.

These types of evaluations are subject to the supervisor personal bias, however, and the majority of employees end up with marks of satisfactory, which limits this system reliability and accuracy.

Behavior-Focused Performance Appraisal

The behaviorally anchored rating system (BARS) judges your employees actions using a rating scale to measure specific behaviors. Four rating scales are used in behavior-focused evaluations: graphic rating scales, behaviorally anchored rating scales, forced choice scales and mixed standards scales.

Graphic rating judges behaviors on a sliding scale from "excellent" to "poor;" average employees results should cluster in the middle, with poor employees near the bottom and exceptional employees near the top.

Behaviorally Anchored Scales

Behaviorally anchored scales rely on very specific evaluators to score the employee actions as pass or fail. For example, "Does the employee answer the telephone with the correct greeting?" or "Does s/he verify all customer information in the correct order?"

Forced-Choice Scale

The forced-choice scale lists rankings of performance such as "poor," "needs improvement," "average," "above average" or "excellent," with no other options; a mixed standards scale is a forced-choice scale with room for administrator comments.

Unstructured Method

Many older performance evaluations relied on the employee personal qualities as reported by a supervisor. The unstructured method relies directly on the superior subjective opinion without an objective rating scale. An unstructured evaluation might simply be a statement or description from a manager to a question such as, What is Jane like?

The unstructured method is unreliable because it is contingent on personality chemistry, says the Community for Human Resource Management (CHRM).

Straight Ranking Method

The straight ranking method compares employees to each other, ranking them from best to worst. While it often easy to point out the top and bottom performers, those in the middle can prove harder to put in order. An example of straight ranking would be a customer service center that gave points for completed service tickets. Employers often post ranks anonymously by employee number.

Although the ranking criteria are specific, they also are subjective due to the customer input where ticket completion would not always be in the employee's hands. This subjectivity, says CHRM, makes straight ranking unreliable as a tool for evaluating specific employees.

Paired Comparison Method

The paired comparison method compares each employee with every other employee in a group. According to CHRM, paired comparison considered more reliable as it is based on a systematic method of comparison and evaluation. Paired comparisons work best in situations where only one employee will be promoted; each is compared and ranked against the others on various factors until one stands out.

Grading and Checklist

The grading method uses standard A to F letter grades in different categories to rate each employee, while the checklist method relies on a list of yes or no questions such as, Is the employee helpful to his peers? In each of these evaluation types, the specific standards are set in advance and defined as categories to evaluate.

Management By Objective

Modern evaluation methods try to remove some the subjectivity and bias inherent in traditional methods. MBO, or management by objective, appraisals require the employee and supervisor to agree on a set of objectives before the evaluation. The process relies on goal setting and constructive feedback to be successful.

Psychological Employee Appraisals

Psychological appraisals assess the employee intellectual ability, emotional stability, analytical skills and other psychological traits using objective psychological evaluation processes. These evaluations are useful in preparing and developing training methods, and for placing employees on appropriate teams.

360-Degree Feedback

360-degree feedback requires the employer to survey co-workers, supervisors, subordinates and even customers about each employee actions. The multiple feedback channels offer objective perspectives of behavioral traits and actions. "From [360-degree] feedback, the worker is able to set goals for self-development, which will advance their career and benefit the organization," according to Terri Linmann, author of "360-degree Feedback: Weighing the Pros and Cons."

What is true about the paired comparison method of measuring employee performance?

Which method is used to measure employee performance?

What is the major limitation of the paired comparison method of appraising performance?

Which of the following is a comparative method for performance evaluations quizlet?