Performance Management Buy-in Methods - Coursework Example

PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT ‘BUY-IN’ METHODS AND PERSONAL GOAL AT THE WORKPLACE Student Name Course Code Tutor Name Institution Date Task A: Performance Management ‘Buy-In’ Methods The changing world demands more productivity and efficiency from businesses more than in any other historical time. Businesses need to increase performance for them to be ahead of competitors. Organizations are employing people with advanced professional and technical skills who cannot be under totalitarian management. It has been understood that the employees’ commitment and ability have the greatest impact on productivity and efficiency. As such, managers should develop strategies to increase employee engagement in their organizations (Markos & Sridevi, 2010, 89). This paper will discuss the measures that an organization can take to increase employee commitment and participation (‘buy in’). A firm can increase employee engagement by focusing on all the three types of commitment. Affective commitment involves the involvement with, attachment to and identification with the organization. This relationship is only seen in those employees who stay in the organization because they want to. Continuance commitment involves the awareness with the consequences of leaving the organization. In this relationship the employees stay in the organization because they need to. Finally, normative commitment involves the obligation on them to stay. In this relationship, the employees stay because they ought to (Brown & Wiswell, 2003, 30). To give the employees an opportunity to contribute and have a chance to be themselves, an organization should ensure that the employees understand and appreciate the meaningfulness of their work. Employers who find meaning in their work are more likely to look for development and promotion opportunities. The employees then share the value-meaning alignment, purpose and meaning at work (Markos & Sridevi, 2010, 91). Affective commitment refers to the willingness of the employees to stay in the organization. Employees develop strong affective commitment when they contribute and share values with the organization. The employees develop loyalty and they become less opportunistic (Brown, McHardy, McNabb & Taylor, 2011, 3). Supervisory trust, job satisfaction and job involvement are positively related to organizational commitment and participation. These factors also have a negative relationship with employee turnover. Employees who do not intend to leave are the ones that are most committed (Brown & Wiswell, 2003, 28). Employees also desire to be given an opportunity to grow and develop for them to be satisfied with their work (Markos & Sridevi, 2010, 91). This can help create organizational trust among employees. Employees who have organizational trust develop support and confidence in their employers. The Employees believe that the employer is trustworthy and straightforward and ready to follow through on his promises (Brown, McHardy, McNabb & Taylor, 2011, 6). Employees who have trust in their leaders are less likely to lose commitment in cases of negative feedback. Negative feedback that is accompanied with encouragement and clarification rather than disapproval and reprimand is more effective at enhancing employee commitment (Brown & Wiswell, 2003, 86). The management should involve the employees in roles such as decision making. This creates a sense of feeling involved or valued. Employees who feel valued are more likely to be committed to their organizations. To achieve this, the management can also give the employees an opportunity to voice their ideas, show concern for the well-being and health of the employees and give them a chance to develop and grow themselves and their jobs (Markos & Sridevi, 2010, 91). Employee participation is positively related to commitment. Company policies that change personality characteristics of the employees can be used to increase affective commitment through job satisfaction (Brown, McHardy, McNabb & Taylor, 2011, 5). A firm can greatly enhance employee engagement through proper communication. Effective communication involves giving the employees an opportunity to give the management their views and opinions. The employees should also have access to the company news and developments (Markos & Sridevi, 2010, 91). Organizational communication has a positive relationship with employee commitment. The employees involved in the achievement of the organizational goals get job satisfaction and therefore become more committed (Brown, McHardy, McNabb & Taylor, 2011, 5). Manager practices are important in employee commitment because they act as a model for job performance. Employers who have good relationships with their workers get better work outcomes. The personal attributes of the employees include attitudes and personality, temperament, abilities, skills, knowledge and organizational context. Organizational context includes human resource practices, social setting, physical setting and leadership. The context affect the employees directly in their context of performance (Markos & Sridevi, 2010, 92). Managers can increase the commitment of employees by exhibiting individualized consideration, intellectual stimulation, idealized influence as well as management-by-exception and contingent reward leadership (Brown & Wiswell, 2003, 3). Employee commitment to an organization depends on their relationship with the leader. This relationship also depends on the behaviors that the leaders exhibit. Task-oriented leadership behavior is based on the tasks that the employees perform while relations-oriented leadership behavior is based on the relationship quality of the employees and the leaders. The leaders can adopt the relations-oriented leadership behavior to facilitate employee engagement (Brown & Wiswell, 2003, 80). Worker compensation is also an important factor in employee commitment and participation. The pay of a company should be reasonable and comparable to the average of the market. The company should also link performance with reward. However, the pay alone cannot effectively increase employee engagement. Human resource is a social being influenced by many factors (Markos & Sridevi, 2010, 92). Contingent reward items fall under task oriented leadership. Leaders can alternatively build trust, recognize accomplishments, emphasize development, encourage creativity and inspire a vision that can be shared by all employees to increase employee commitment and participation (Brown & Wiswell, 2003, 86). In conclusion, a firm can increase productivity and efficiency by facilitating ‘buy in’. The leaders should focus on enhancing the affective, continuance and normative aspects of employee commitment and participation. Giving employees an opportunity to participate enables the employees to appreciate the meaningfulness of their jobs. Developing organizational trust develop helps the employees to support and have confidence in their employers. Involving the employees in roles such as decision making creates a sense of feeling involved or valued and this increases employee engagement. It is important for a firm to improve manager practices. Manager practices influence their relationship with employees and this relationship affects employee commitment and participation. Task B: Personal Goal at the Workplace Getting a Promotion to a Leadership Position Acquiring New Skills on Management New skills are acquired by education and training. Among other skills that I would learn to acquire a promotion, the most important will be completing all the seven modules of management. This training would be part of the lifelong learning which maintain the competencies and skills gained from my basic education and initial training. Learning management skills is viable because there is easy access with opportunities being open for the initial and lifelong learning. The learning opportunities give people an opportunity to fulfill their aspirations. Some challenges that may arise include inadequate funds, migrant status and a training schedule that compromises performance at work. This training would empower me in the development of my full capacity in leadership. Proper management skills increases the productivity and efficiency of the workers and the enterprise. Learning facilitates future development and innovation. Job growth is enhanced by increased foreign and domestic investment. The training can also facilitate job satisfaction and higher wages (International Labour office, 2010, 4-5). There should be a strong partnership between the workers, employers and government to create a strong relationship between work and learning. This may involve getting the right incentives from a sound funding plans to invest in the appropriate skills. I would expect the employer to be an important training provider. The workplace would provide workplace experience, internship and apprenticeship which are essential to the training. The outcome measure of the training is most importantly the new skills acquired, and the certificate of completion and the grades attained (International Labour office, 2010, 23). Supporting and Engaging in Teamwork People engage in teamwork to foster the virtue of cooperation in using the various capabilities and strengths of workers. An organization can employ teamwork in areas such as service teams, production teams and management teams. Teamwork can be organized in the basis of service, part of a process or a distinct product. Change into teamwork involves changing the supervisory and management roles (Teamwork: Success through People, nd, 1-2). The strengths of encouraging teamwork include the ability of the management to actively support the teamwork environment. The particular managerial tasks to involve cooperation and team working can be acquired in the organization. The challenges of switching to teamwork involve introducing it to the necessary long-term transformation. Changing the attitudes of the employees, managers and supervisors may pose a challenge and may take a long time (Teamwork: Success through People, nd, 6-7). The enterprise can use the variety of skills available to the employers to perform a variety of tasks. Autonomy is facilitated by the decisions of the operator on the pace and order of the work. The tasks of the employees becomes part of the whole job to create identity. Teamwork also encourages responsibility, feedback, social contacts, balanced workload, achievement and development (Teamwork: Success through People, nd, 4-5). For teamwork to be successful, the management of the firm must support it. Teamwork may involve training the employees to acquire the necessary teamwork skills. The management should work collaboratively with the employees and provide the required resources such as the trainees. The outcome for teamwork can be measured by the degree of cooperation (Teamwork: Success through People, nd, 12). Develop a Positive Work Attitude A positive work attitude is related to job satisfaction and it involves a positive or pleasurable emotional state that results from job experiences and the appraisal of the job. A positive attitude involves positive thinking, cognition, feeling and affect. This is achieved through appropriate human resource practices, cultural and disproportional influences (Saari & Judge, 2004, 396). The strengths of improving my own attitude to work is that I am in full control. Work attitude depends on job satisfaction that correlates with core self-evaluation which is the key personality trait. I can also improve the other personality traits of conscientiousness and extra-version. The challenges include getting a perfect match with the jobs in the organization and receiving appropriate selection from the organization (Saari & Judge, 2004, 396-397). Job satisfaction has a strong relationship to performance. Performance is a prerequisite for getting a promotion or acknowledgement. The relationship between job satisfaction improves when is defined to include organizational citizenship behavior and other performance appraisals. Job satisfaction improves performance especially in complex and professional jobs (Saari & Judge, 2004, 398). Work situation is an important determinant of job satisfaction. I would expect the organization to focus on improving the nature of my work. Compensation programs should also be well designed to show support of the organization. Supervision and management practices are also important for developing a positive attitude. A positive attitude can be gauged by scope, variety, autonomy and job challenge (Saari & Judge, 2004, 397). Adopting Effective Delegation Practices Effective delegation becomes more important with an increase in rank in an organization. Successful delegation takes place when tasks are turned over, for the right reasons, to the right people who have the authority and resources to act. Effective delegation involves proper follow up, performance expectations and the necessary feedback (Bakken, 2006, 1). The strengths of delegation include a ready and competent workforce in the firm who are ready to complete the tasks successfully. A team ready to learn and develop will fulfill the tasks delegated to them to advance in their positions. The weaknesses of delegation include uncertainty of the performance of the employees. Follow up and explaining may be time consuming and some managers may be concerned that the employees are already working too hard (Bakken, 2006, 2). Effective delegation would give me an opportunity to increase output. Tasks done over and over can be delegated to the employees because this would also enable them to learn new skills. Proper management should involve delegation to lower cost people. This forms effective division of labor to decrease the expenses of running the organization (Bakken, 2006, 3). To effectively delegate, the organization should provide clear roles to the employees. The organization should support and regulate effective delegation. Effective delegation may also require learning effective delegation which can be acquired in relevant management courses. Feedback can be evaluated individually or by the organization to determine the effectiveness of the delegation (Bakken, 2006, 6). References Bakken, E., 2006. Learning to Delegate. Ceridian Corporation. Available at [Accessed 26 August 2015]. Brown, B. & Wiswell, A., 2003. Employees’ Organizational Commitment and Their Perception of Supervisors’ Relations-Oriented and Task-Oriented Leadership Behaviors. VT, pp. 1-89. [Online] Available at [Accessed 25 August 2015]. Brown, S., McHardy, J., McNabb, R. & Taylor, K., 2011. Workplace Performance, Worker Commitment and Loyalty. IZA, pp.1-25. [Online] Available at [Accessed 25 August 2015]. International Labour office, 2010. A Skilled Workforce for Strong, Sustainable and Balanced Growth. International Labour Organization, Available at: [Accessed 26 August 2015]. Markos, S. & Sridevi, M., 2010. Employee Engagement: The Key to Improving Performance. International Journal of Business and Management, 5(12). Available at [Accessed 25 August 2015]. Saari, L. and Judge, T., 2004. Employee Attitudes and Job Satisfaction. 1st ed. [ebook] New York: IBM Corporation, pp.396-404. Available at: [Accessed 26 Aug. 2015]. Teamwork: Success through People, nd, 6-7). ACAS, pp.1-23 Available at: [Accessed 26 August 2015]. Read More