Inaccurate assumptions about the situation and typically is doomed to failure.

While the interviewee may go through the motions of "buying" the interviewer's suggestions the sales approach to appraisal is based upon inaccurate assumptions about the situation and typically is doomed to failure.

Procedures

Planning: Having seen the types of strategies to be avoided, we turn now to techniques for effective appraisal interviewing. When planning the interview, it often is useful to develop an outline of topic which the interview is to cover. According to Kindall and Gatza, a five-step structure should be employed:

1. agreement concerning job content and the relative

importance of the duties the employee performs

2. establishment of performance targets

3. discussion of the target programme

4. establishment of checkpoints for progress evaluation

5. discussion of the employee's efforts to meet target previously established.

While this approach, management by objectivesapplies to an ongoing evaluation process that may involve a'series of interviews the basic structure may serve" a framework for a single appraisal.

Beginning: Because the appraisal interview usually produces tension in the interviewee, it seems best to avoid initial small talk. As Kindall and Gatza indicate, one useful beginning is to reach agreement concerning the duties expected of the worker and how performance on those duties is to be measured. These matters should not be dictated by the manager to the interviewee; rather they should be arrived at cooperatively with input from both participants.

When agreement on these matters has been achieved, the interview should progress to the interviewee's performance record, considering specifically how well her work measures up to the established guidelines. Here the interviewee is presented with whatever information the manager has concerning her performane and is given the opportunity to respond with whatever comments, explanations, defenses, or questions she may have. If the threat presen in the situation seems to hinder the employee's responses, the interviewer shquld ask for them. The function of this portion of the interview is not only to provide the interviewee with information concrning management's judgments of her performance but to allow the employee to react to that information, "to assess its fairness and accuracy, and to explain any factors which may underlie the performance figures.

Since the ultimate goal of the appraisal interview is to improve future performance, most of the interviewer's attention should be devoted to finding methods for improvement. While we might be tempted simply todictate those methods, the best results are obtained by asking the intelviewee two questions: What do you think you can do to improve? And what can we do to help? These questions serve several important functions. First, they demonstrate that management respects the worker's intellect and recognizes his ability to make decisions for himself. Second, they provide the worker with an opportunity to determine his own future behaviours and to help establish guidelines by which his perfOlmances will be judged. Coch and French found that when employees are allowed to participate in policy-making they show high satisfaction with and commitment to the decisions made. Finally, these questions demonstrate that management is genuinely interested in the employee's progress and in

. helping him attain it.