Performance evaluation alternatives

The two behaviorally oriented evaluation systems have as their major disadvantage the cost and difficulty of devising appropriate instruments. Their development can be time consuming and their use may require a separate instrument for each job category or subcategory being evaluated. Obviously there are different behaviors required of admitting clerks versus food service workers, hence requiring different evaluative tools. Furthermore, the required behaviors of surgical nurses and pediatric nurses will differ, requiring specially designed instruments. However, once the instrument is developed, the use of the behaviorally oriented evaluations will give a superior result. Since the instrument is specifically job related and less subjective in its scoring, the results of the evaluation better reflect the employees' actual performance and are more likely to stand up in court. Furthermore, since the orientation is toward behaviors rather than characteristics, the evaluation is less likely to be perceived as a personal attack by the individual receiving a substandard evaluation. Therefore, it serves as a better basis for improving performance since it identifies specific activities that need correction rather than personal characteristics that must change. Finally, the behaviorally oriented instrument may be seen as a much fairer evaluative tool by employees since they frequently have input into its development and can see that the behaviors measured are directly related to the accomplishment of job objectives. Likewise, employees will view the tool as fairer since it is much easier to challenge adverse scores based on objective evaluations than on those subjectively based.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)