People Management
Skill development
Conduct a survey of work life balance of working individuals
List out the modern tools of performance assessment and evaluation
1) Assessment Centers:
In the 1930s, the concept of assessment centers was initially applied to military situations in the German army and
the War Office Selection Board of the British Army in 1960s. The basic purpose of this method was to examine the
candidates in the social situation, using the variety of procedures and a number of assessors. Earlier, assessment
centers were being used for executive hiring but these days these centers are used for the purpose of evaluating
supervisory or executive potential.
An assessment center is a central location where the managers may come together to participate in job-related
exercises, who are then evaluated by the trained observers.
2) Management by Objectives (MBO):
The management concept as was conceived by Drucker, reflects a management philosophy which values and utilises
employee contributions. Application of MBO in the field of performance appraisal is a recent thinking. The MBO
process seems to be most useful with managerial personnel and employees who have a fairly wide range of
flexibility and self-control in their jobs.
Therefore, the Management by Objectives approach involves establishing performance goals jointly by the superior
and subordinate. For this programme to be effective, both superior and subordinate must be actively involved in
objective formulation and agree on the methods to be used to assess performance.
3) 360 Degree Feedback:
In this method of performance appraisal, information is collected from all persons around the employees —
superiors, subordinates, peers, and internal and external customers. Hence, the title 360 degree feedback. The
feedback is usually used for determining training and development needs rather than the compensation revision. The
appraiser, listed earlier, complete survey questionnaires on the individual.
4) Psychological Appraisals:
Psychological appraisals are conducted to assess the future potential of the employees. In this method, the past and
actual performance is not assessed. The focus is on the future potential. Big organizations generally employ full-
time industrial psychologists for the purpose.
Usually, the appraisals consist of psychological tests, in-department interviews and discussions with the immediate
supervisors. The areas covered about an employee are his or her emotional stability, reasoning abilities, sociability,
intellectual abilities, ability to foresee the future and analytical abilities.
Analyse two cases on any of the above content indicated above
Team building
Colgomex is a large consumer products company. The CEO of the company left and Mr. Chatterzi, who
was second in command to the CEO took over as CEO of the company. Mr. Rajesh Talwar is a senior
executive in the company and has his own views. He has been in the industry a decade and he thinks he
knows how to tackle the slump the industry is going through. He did not waste any time and talked to
the new CEO and told him what he thought needed to be done in the company. The CEO heard him out
and suggested that he give him some time to learn the ropes. Eventually when he did lay out his plans,
Mr. Talwar was shocked to see all his suggestions completely ignored. When he asked the CEO about
this, he responded that he wanted a team that supported him completely and hinted that Mr. Talwar
leave the company if he was unhappy. He actually ventures far enough to offer his assistance in finding a
new job for Talwar. Mr. Talwar was shocked. He did not understand what to do. One option was not to
take it personally. It was probably just a mismatch between his and the CEO’s style of functioning. The
other option was to gracefully bow out while he still retains the goodwill of the organization and
colleagues. He should start exploring opportunities elsewhere and take up the offer that suits him the
best. He is still-undecided between these two options.
Managing job stress
Mr. Rana is a 50 years old store manager. He feels that his difficult job should earn him respect off the
job as well as on the job. He is in an excellent position, but he feels that he hasn’t progressed well in the
company. He has been offered managerial position in larger stores but has turned down offers because
he did not want to move his family. He behaves as if every incident on the job is a major issue. He
believes that a store manager should not make any errors. Making an error is the same as being
unworthy or unreliable. He always questions his worth and ability and tests it against the errors he
made. This striving for perfection irritates a lot of his subordinates because many believe that making
mistakes is a part of life that can’t be avoided.
A lot of things that top management does, brother Mr. Rana. For instance, he was told on a Monday
that he had to begin training two assistant managers next week. He was particularly upset about not
being asked about that assistant’s schedule of training. Moreover, this week he was overloaded with
commitments and found the training assignment to be ill timed. When the assistants reported from
training next week, they were introduced to a tense, irritated store manager who did not hide his
feelings. He unloaded his frustration on his subordinates also, who did not move fast enough. A 20
minute shouting and screaming followed. After the things settled down, Mr. Rana was unhappy with
himself for losing control. He became withdrawn and depressed for the next week on the job
and at home also.
Draft a career development of working individual in the middle level
management (study any one from below table)
