Determinants of Job Perfomance - Essay Example

Once the employee possesses the basic requirement of knowledge and skills, the level of performance can be set against the standards provided by the office and, therefore, it becomes a determinant of job performance. According to the explanations by University of Human Resource Services (Feb. 2005), job performance is the kind of expectations for a particular duty of the employee. It is the expected outcome of how the job is to be done. It is the observed behavior of the personnel on how they performed the work assigned to them.

Job performance is often described on the basis of results whether it is very satisfactory, satisfactory, unsatisfactory or very unsatisfactory. I believe that knowledge and skills are the primary requirements in determining job performance because it is the regular requirement expected from everyone. Knowledge and skills are the set of common standards and behaviors that are expected from all personnel. For instance, all supervisors or employees are expected to do similar work or everyone in the unit may be expected to perform similarly around several functions, sales agents are expected to make sales for the company, customer service agents or call center representatives are required to respond to customers, and they should have the basic knowledge in performing of what is expected of them.

Knowledge and skills are in line with the expectancy theory that is based on the perceived effort relationship. Quick MBA (n.d.) explains work performance is based on past experiences, self confidence and difficulty of the performance goal. Sheridan, Slocum and Byung, (Feb. 1975) concluded in their study that the expectancy theory model is a valid indicator of job performance. When an employee believes that he is working at a significant project is and contributing to its successful completion, he is inspired to work better.

Another author, A. Grant (2008), said in his study that the significance of the task increases work performance. This leads me to conclude that mental ability to understand the work assigned to the employee is an indicator of job performance. Knowledge of the job is further divided into two categories. These are the declarative knowledge, and procedural knowledge. For instance, declarative knowledge includes knowledge of principles, facts, ideas, etc. (Turban, E., and J. Aronson, 1988). This becomes an indicator of job performance because the employee can apply to the work situations his particular knowledge of the principles.

A manager should have the ability to see the big picture be able to create innovative ideas. A manager is expected to integrate concepts, apply different solutions, methods and approaches to the day to day operations. A manager thinks horizontally and simultaneously, and knows how to ask and answer questions. He should know how to challenge and to innovate strategies. In the same way, individual personnel are expected to give their utmost skills and competency in the process. As differentiated from declarative knowledge, procedural knowledge is the type of knowledge someone has and demonstrates it by doing the actual job (Wise Geek, n. d.).

For instance, as demonstrated in Wise Geek, procedural knowledge is knowing how to do things. In accounting, balancing of accounts has some procedures and is called procedural method that has a