1. TOTAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT
Unit-5
Feedback and performance appraisal
Presented by
N.Vigneshwari

2. Feedback Essential Both for Employees and Management
It is more humane to be curious to know about the result of an action. Actions are taken not only by management, but also by junior employees in organizations. Therefore, both the management and the employees should look forward to getting a feedback on the action taken, the employees from the management and vice versa, in the interest of improving quality continuously. Such feedback should be analyzed by the concerned individuals, which would be a good input for the next decision to be taken.

3. Cont…
Feedback should not be undermined. The natural human nature of giving feedback should be encouraged. Unless feedback is given, the person concerned may not be very sure about the effect of his actions. Feedback is thus important for practicing Total Quality Management (TQM) in organizations, both for the employees and the management.

4. Management should Seek Feedback
It is the responsibility of the management to seek feedback. The management should therefore adopt suitable strategies to get the right feedback from the employees as well as customers. The management should adopt the Management By Walking Around (MBWA) concept advocated by Tom Peters to get the right feedback. Of course, MBWA should be practiced in the right manner for getting the desired results.

5. Cont…
Therefore, during MBWA the management should talk to employees and get feedback both from their verbal communication as well as their body language. The MBWA is one ofthe effective means of getting direct feedback on the actions taken. The management should not carry a notepad for noting down the feedback, for it will not enable free flow of communications from the employees. The discussions during MBWA should be informal and should put the employee at ease so that the employee will give true feedback fearlessly.

6. Cont…
The management has many forums for getting feedback in their organization on quality matters. One of them is through the Quality Council where the management should encourage the members to talk freely. Only open talking will bring the true feedback. It should also be noted that higher the level of management, more difficult it becomes to get the correct information. This has to be kept in view, while receiving feedback from the employees. Another important source for feedback is the monthly summary on quality submitted by the management representative. Such summaries should be analyzed thoroughly by the management.

7. Cont…
They should also peruse the analysis reports as well as the recommendations of the improvement teams set up for TQM implementation. The top management will get a large number of papers, reports, minutes, etc. and won‘t get the time to read all of them thoroughly, The management should select appropriate ones for perusal. Priority should be given for perusal of information, which provides feedback. The responsibility for giving feedback and getting feedback lies solely with the management like other management functions.

8. Feedback to the Employees
Every employee in the organization should receive a feedback on the quality of his output. Quality does not only mean the conformance of the product or service to the requirements, but also the timeliness, behavioural requirements and all attributes of TQM. It is important that every employee in the organization is given feedback. If it is not done, the employee will not realize the true quality of his output. The employees who are doing well as well as those who are not up to the mark, are to be given feedback.

9. Cont…
The feedback to an employee who has done well will definitely motivate him to do still better. Similarly, the feedback to an employee who is not doing well will give him a chance to analyze and correct himself quickly. Therefore, feedback should become one of the routine features of supervisors at all levels. Some of the features which would enable success in feedback for TQM, are described in the following paragraphs:

10. Giving Appropriate Feedback
When a feedback is given, it should be the most appropriate. The feedback should never be exaggerated or under played; it should be a correct feedback. The persons giving feedback are at different levels in the hierarchy, IQ, education, knowledge and experience. Therefore, it is important that the person giving feedback uses a language easily understandable by the receiver. The person giving feedback should realize that unless the feedback is understandable by the employee concerned, it is not going to result in any improvement in the quality of his output.

11. Cont…
Therefore, the supervisor should change his style, reduce the level of technical jargons to that of the employee in front of him and then communicate in a simple and understandable manner. The task of the management is to find out the right performance level of the employees and then give the feedback. The employee may be good in one aspect and may be wrong in all others. It should be clearly stated where he is good and where he has to improve. To make a lasting impression it is better to first appreciate the good actions before saying where the employee is weak. Therefore, it is very important that right feedback is given.

12. Timely Feedback
Feedback should never be accumulated forever. The feedback, as and when required, should be given at the appropriate time. The feedback session could be short and brief so that it will be taken seriously

13. Watch Effect of Feedback
Each feedback session is a corrective action of the system, to use the terminology of ISO Therefore, the effect of feedback has to be monitored, studied and analyzed. If the feedback is given in an appropriate manner and if it is right then definitely the employee will be motivated to correct himself. As a result of feedback if the employee is not improving the performance, then the management has to find out the reasons, so as to give again the feedback of the employee's behaviour, workmanship, etc.

14. Cont…
Employees should be continuously monitored after the feedback is given to see that the employee improves and the feedback is useful to the organization. We have been discussing about feedback given to an erring employee. The effect of feedback on a good employee should also be studied and appropriate action taken.

15. Continuous Feedback
Like continuous improvement, feedback should also be given continuously. Some employees who are doing extremely well also need feedback. The feedback will be never ending for any of the supervisory persons, since the system will try to drift away from the set goals often and the management will be required to correct the system through the feedback mechanism. In a large organization, one employee may improve but another may deteriorate. It is the responsibility of the management therefore to look for feedback and give feedback. Thus, feedback is a continuous mechanism.

16. PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL
Performance appraisal is to be used for the development of employees. Deming does not advocate periodic performance appraisal. However, Philip Crosby speaks that by and large they serve the purpose. One has to adopt the PDSA technique even for the performance appraisal of employees. Usually in the beginning of the year, the supervisor discusses with the employee concerned and they jointly arrive at an action plan for the whole year with specific milestones for each quarter. At the end of every quarter, the supervisor and the employee discuss together about the achievements with regard to the plan.

17. Cont…
This meeting may result in revising the plan for the subsequent quarters. The performance against various tasks is to be assessed. Some may adopt a scale of one to five to indicate the quality of performance of the task. Some may use terms starting from unsatisfactory to excellent. A suitable performance evaluation form has to be designed by each organization. The quarterly review need not be kept confidential from the employees. In 90 per cent of the cases, this may not pose any problem. However, there may be cases, where the employee may be agitated that he has been treated unfairly. Such disputes are to be resolved tactfully. However, the supervisor should also be trained on evaluating the performance in an objective manner. The performance of each employee should be reviewed on a quarterly basis and the reports submitted to the management. Such reports should be used by the management, for various purposes as:

18. Cont… Promotion Granting of additional increments
Training the employees
Reallocation of duties, etc.
The performance appraisal is a formal activity carried out by the supervisor for each employee. Innovative techniques can be used for motivating the employees, based on performance appraisal. It must be ensured that the performance appraisal in no way demotivates the employees. The most important requirement for carrying out performance appraisal is giving awards and continuing it successfully.

19. References
Total quality management – Subburaj Ramasamy

20. Thank you