Employee Motivation and Performance Appraisal

Author: admin

If you have been frequently reading our articles, Employee Motivation has been one of the key topics we targeted before .. and that is for a very good reason (and it’s not that we just feel like it ) .. it’s because Employee Motivation can be the cutting edge between success and failure of both employees and organizations.

We have discussed earlier different approaches such as Employee Motivation through Financial Compensation, through Positive Environment, and through Praise and Recognition, and these are all valid approaches to motivate employees. Some are better than others, but most are complimentary and need to be used in parallel. But how does it relate so closely to performance appraisal?

In fact, as performance appraisal is something that cannot be done once a year (shocking eh?), so does motivation. It is a day to day act that needs to be always on the mind of the manager so as to make the best out of the employee. Let me just drill down a little more onto the topic of performance appraisal due to its importance to motivation.

Well see, performance appraisal needs to be a successive act that keeps running through the assessment period, registering what the employee is doing across all the performance period, providing feedback and motivating him/her to attain and outperform to reach his goals. (check out our article about Is Your Performance Appraisal System Useful?)

So employee motivation and performance appraisal go hand in hand. To get the best performance you need to motivate employees. Simple no? I wonder why so many people just don’t get it, or maybe do get it but just don’t want to admit it.

Now in order to make the best out of both, motivating employees and assessing them, you need to combine the different approaches for motivation:

financial compensation
positive environment
praise and recognition
but also the most important factor that Dan Pink illustrates in his book (check out our article about New Perception for Motivating Employees in 2012), which is allowing employees to fulfill their highest potential as human beings, the ability to grow and develop, and direct their own lives.

The same applies for performance appraisals, which needs to be:

as objective as possible
keeping track of all accomplishments of the employee during his work period
frequent meetings and mini-assessments
realigning goals according to changed work requirements
setting realistic milestones for the employee to accomplish

So in essence, employee motivation and performance appraisal do go hand in hand, and are complimentary. You need to properly perform both so as to succeed and get the best outcome.

For a better work environment, and better future for all – employees and organizations!

Photo Credit by rick