If members of a department or unit in an organization share their documents as a means of identifying staff strengths, needs and responsibilities, then this procedure can effectively serve the purposes of team building (Function Four) and resource assessment (Function Five). Although the unstructured documentation procedure can meet many of the functions of performance appraisal, it is usually much less effective and takes more time than several of the procedures described below.
Structured Narration
This procedure relies primarily on short-answer questions. The evaluator answers a series of questions concerning the employee’s performance. For example, “In what areas of this person’s job is improvement clearly needed?” “Describe the professional practices of this administrator in terms of initiative and vitality.” “To what extent has this employee accomplished the following objectives?” The procedure permits several people to evaluate the employee anonymously and usually includes a rating scale for more detailed and specific information.
Structured narrations can be designed to provide most of the twelve functions of performance appraisal described above. For example, an inventory of resources and needs (Function Five) can be constructed from carefully formulated questions about employees’ strengths and weaknesses. If the questions are posed in a diagnostic rather than an evaluative manner, the results can be useful for developmental programs (Function Two), such as skills training or management development.
On the other hand, the structured narration is usually not specific enough to satisfy many of the other functions. Structured narrations typically do not meet the need for accountability (Functions Six, Seven and Eight) nor provide information for resource purposes (Function Nine). Furthermore, these narrations rarely are compatible with intention-focused assessment processes (Function Three).
