The effectiveness of performance appraisals for teachers in Kabwe District

Thesis (M.A.) , 2014 , 117 Pages

Leadership and Human Resources - Miscellaneous

The purpose of this quantitative and qualitative research was to assess the effectiveness of performance appraisals with regard to promotion in the Ministry of Education, Science, Vocational Training and Early Education in Kabwe District. There is a concern on how employees are rewarded by the way of promotion in the MOESVTEE in Kabwe District. Some teachers complain that, underserving teachers are those that get promoted at the expense of other hardworking teachers. The research used teacher’s effort, ability, role perception and performance as independent variables with promotion as the dependent variable.

A cross sectional survey, structured questionnaire, simple random sampling was used to collect the data and multiple regression was used to analyze the data using mega start. Data was collected from 123 head-teachers, deputy-teachers and teachers using a questionnaire survey. Data was analyzed into two stages firstly it was checked for validity, reliability, identification outliners and normality of the data. Secondly multiple regression was conducted to test the hypotheses.

Results from the survey indicate that, the Performance Appraisal system for teachers in Kabwe District is not effective. However, promotion practices were found to influence performance of teachers in the District. Teachers in the District have a negative perception on how promotions are carried out.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

DEDICATION

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

TABLE OF CONTENTS

LIST OF TABLES

LIST OF FIGURES

LIST OF ACRONYMS

ABSTRACT

CHAPTER ONE
BACKGROUND OF THE RESEARCH
1.0 Introduction
1.1 Ministry of Education, Science, Vocational Training and Education (MOESVTEE) in Kabwe District
1.2 Statement of the problem
1.3 Research questions
1.4.0 Main objective of the research
1.4.1 Research specific objectives of the research
1.5 The scope of the research
1.6 The significance of the research
1.7 Key Concepts of the research
1.8. Outline of the chapters
1.9 Summary

CHAPTER TWO
LITERATURE REVIEW
2.0 Introduction
2.1 Promotions
2.1.1 Empirical Evidence on Promotions
2.2 Promotions as Incentives
2.2.1 Empirical Evidence of Promotion as Incentives
2.3 Types of Promotion
2.3.1 Empirical Evidence on the types of Promotion
2.4 Importance of Promotions to employees and organisations
2.5 Impact of promotion on job satisfaction and performance
2.5.1 Empirical Evidence on impact of promotion on job satisfaction
2.6 Employee Effort and Promotion
2.6.1 Empirical evidence on Effort and Promotion
2.7 Employee Ability and Promotion
2.7.1 Empirical Evidence on Employee Ability and Promotion
2.8 Employee Performance and Promotion
2.8.1 Empirical evidence on employee performance and promotion
2.9 Role perception and promotion
2.9.1 Empirical evidence on role perception and promotion
2.10 Performance Appraisal (PA)
2.10.1 Empirical Evidence on Performance Appraisals
2.11 Teacher’s perception of performance appraisals
2.11.1 Empirical Evidence on teacher’s perception of Performance Appraisals
2.12 Lessons Learnt
2.13 Summary

CHAPTER THREE
THEORETICAL AND CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK
3.0 Introduction
3.1 Theoretical review
3.2 Expectancy Theory of Motivation
3.3 Application of the Expectancy Theory of Motivation
3.4 Equity Theory of Motivation
3.5 Application of Equity Theory of Motivation
3.6 Conceptual Framework
3.7 Hypotheses of the research
3.8 Operationalization of the concepts
3.8.0 Performance Appraisal Concepts
3.8.1 Effort operationalization
3.8.2 Ability operationalization
3.8.3 Performance operationalization
3.8.4 Role perception operationalization
3.8.5 Performance Appraisal operationalization
3.8.6 Promotion operationalization
3.9 Summary

CHAPTER 4
RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY
4.0 Introduction
4.1 Research Approach and Design
4.2 Research population
4.3 The Sampling design and Sample size
4.3.1 Sample population
4.3.2 Sample size
4.3.3 Sample size calculation
4.3.4 Sample strategies
4.4 Data Collection
4.4.1 Data collection instrument
4.4.2 Data collection procedure
4.5 Reliability and Validity
4.5.1 Reliability
4.5.2 Validity
4.6 Pretesting the Questionnaire
4.7 Ethical Considerations
4.8 Data Analysis
4.9 Summary

CHAPTER FIVE
DATA ANALYSIS
5.0 Introduction
5.1 Preparation of Data
5.2 Data Analysis
5.2.1. Demographic Data
5.3 Descriptive Statistics for continuous variables
5.4.0 Open ended questions section
5.4.1 Effort question
5.4.2 Ability question
5.4.3. Role perception question
5.4.4 Performance Appraisal question
5.5 Correlation Matrix
5.6 Hypothesis testing
5.6.1 Multiple regression
5.7 Summary

CHAPTER SIX
DISCUSSION OF RESEARCH FINDINGS AND IMPLICATIONS
6.0 Introduction
6.1 Discussion of results (Answering research questions)
6.1.1 Research Question One (1)
6.1.3 Question 2: The transparency of the Performance Appraisal system
6.1.4 Question 3: Is Performance Appraisal often invalid, unfair, discriminatory,
and based on favoritism?
6.1.5 Research Question Two (2)
6.1.6 Research Question Three (3)
6.2 Implications of the research’s findings
6.3 Summary

CHAPTER SEVEN
CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
7.0 Introduction
7.1 Summary of research Conclusions
7.2 Recommendations
7.3 Contribution of the research
7.4 Limitation of the research
7.5 Future research
7.6 Summary

REFERENCES

APPENDIX 1

A LIST OF SCHOOLS IN KABWE DISTRICT

APPENDIX 2

DEDICATION

I would like to dedicate this work to my future children, my lovely nieces and nephews. This work will inspire them a lot and enable them achieve their dreams and goals in life. Lastly, to my wonderful late father Mr. Mathew Sunny Lialabi, who forever remains present in my heart and believed in my potential and would have been very proud of my personal achievements. May His Soul Rest in Eternal Peace.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to thank God for all His blessings and for being my greatest pillar of strength. I could not have reached all that, without God accepting my prayers, wishes and always by my side.

My profound thanks also go to Dr. Chanda Sichinsambwe, my supervisor. I am grateful for your insightful and professional guidance. Through your constant encouragement, I have been able to accomplish this great scholarly feat.

Mr. Matthew Sunny Lialabi and Mrs. Assety Lialabi; my loving parents, your guidance and emphasis on the importance of education resulted in this work. Dad, I wish you had lived to witness this accomplishment.

My siblings, you are a great team! Thanks for holding and encouraging me when I felt like giving up on my studies.

Special thanks to all my friends and colleagues for supporting me to collect data to inform my research.

Lastly, they say success has many fathers and failure is an orphan, though only my name appears on the cover of this dissertation, this work is an offspring of many great minds who in various ways have contributed to its completion; I salute you all.

Thank you all!

LIST OF TABLES

Abbildung in dieser Leseprobe nicht enthalten

LIST OF FIGURES

Abbildung in dieser Leseprobe nicht enthalten

LIST OF ACRONYMS

Abbildung in dieser Leseprobe nicht enthalten

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this quantitative and qualitative research was to assess the effectiveness of performance appraisals with regard to promotion in the Ministry of Education, Science, Vocational Training and Early Education in Kabwe District. There is a concern on how employees are rewarded by the way of promotion in the MOESVTEE in Kabwe District. Some teachers complain that, underserving teachers are those that get promoted at the expense of other hardworking teachers. The research used teacher’s effort, ability, role perception and performance as independent variables with promotion as the dependent variable.

A cross sectional survey, structured questionnaire, simple random sampling was used to collect the data and multiple regression was used to analyze the data using mega start. Data was collected from 123 head-teachers, deputy-teachers and teachers using a questionnaire survey. Data was analyzed into two stages firstly it was checked for validity, reliability, identification outliners and normality of the data. Secondly multiple regression was conducted to test the hypotheses.

Results from the survey indicate that, the Performance Appraisal system for teachers in Kabwe District is not effective. However, promotion practices were found to influence performance of teachers in the District. Teachers in the District have a negative perception on how promotions are carried out.

The research recommended that head-teachers and management team should be trained in the District on conducting performance appraisals. Workshops and seminars should be conducted geared toward improving the way promotions are carried out. Policy makers should endeavor to establish more concrete policies that encourage open and participatory appraisal practices that emphasize collegial and teamwork with regard to promotion in the MOESTVEE in Kabwe District. Policy makers consider revisiting, revising and reviewing the current appraisal system to suit the needs of teachers. The policy makers should consider introducing Information Communication Technology (ICTs) in the practice to make the system effective and also learn from other neighboring countries how they use the Appraisal system to promote employees effective. Lastly, a promotion model should be adopted by government based on merit and performance.

Key words: Performance Appraisal, Promotion, Effort, Ability, Performance and Role perception.

CHAPTER ONE

BACKGROUND OF THE RESEARCH

1.0 Introduction

Promotion is one of the sensitive issues in every employee’s life. Through promotion an employee gets recognition of his or her performance and is motivated to continue in this way. Promotion policies may affect employees’ hopes for advancement and the productivity of the organization. Employees cannot think of being promoted without performance appraisals. The promotion of an employee is entirely dependent upon his or her performance appraisal outcome. Performance appraisals provide employees with recognition for their work efforts. Most managers do not look forward to conducting performance appraisals because of the effort involved. Performance appraisals can be an effective tool if they are used to reward employee performance in a constructive and motivating manner. An employee’s performance appraisal is a process that often combines both written and oral elements whereby management evaluates and provides feedback on employee job performance, including steps to improve or redirect activities as needed.

Promotion is a form of recognition for employees who make significant and effective work contributions which cannot be done without the process of performance appraisal. An organization can undertake performance appraisal into two ways formally and informally (Mathis and Jackson, 2003). The purposes of promotion are many but just to mention a few; promotion stimulates self-development and creates interest in the job (Yoder and Dale, 1972). There are two main basics of promotion, that is, the merit basis which is taken to denote an individual employee`s skills, knowledge, ability, efficiency and aptitude as measured from educational training and past employment record. Lastly promotion is done on seniority basis which refers to relative length of service in the same job and in the same organization (Rodgers, 1986).

Promotion as already noted involves an increase in status, responsibilities and pay, but in certain cases, only the pay increases and the other elements remain stagnant. There are three recognized types of promotion, that is, the vertical promotion, horizontal promotion and dry promotion (Yoder and Dale, 1972). A promotion can be both horizontal and vertical. In horizontal promotion, an employee is promoted from lower level to higher level whereas on the other hand, in vertical promotion an employee is promoted from lower level to higher level or sustained at the same level with more responsibilities only by changing his or her department (Yoder, 1972).

In addition, dry promotion is given in lieu of increase in salary. Designations are different but no change in responsibilities (Yoder, 1972). The promotee may be given one or two increments. Although promotion benefits the individual and the organization, it creates certain problems. They are disappointment of the candidates; refusal of promotions, some superiors will not relieve their subordinates who are promoted. Promotion problems can be minimized through career counseling by the superiors and by formulating a systematic promotion policy.

Another term to look at is systematic performance appraisal which provides information for making decisions about various issues such as promotions, pay increases, layoffs, training and development and transfers. For teachers to continue to develop professionally, they need high-quality performance appraisals. While a majority of schools in Kabwe District claim to have performance appraisals, there is clear evidence that, many teachers are failing to receive the feedback and support they need to become effective teachers. In addition, performance appraisal system is important to any organizational work performance; it determines the organization’s success or failure. However, performance appraisal is one of the most problematic components of human resource (HR) management (Allen and Mayfield, 1983).

History of performance appraisals is quite brief. Performance appraisal has its roots in the beginning of civilization where the most powerful used to appraise the less powerful ones in order to reward them (Grint, 1993). It can be noted that, even slaves were being appraised though it was not a formal appraisal system. Performance appraisals have roots in the early 20th century can be traced to Taylor's pioneering Time and Motion studies (1911). In the 1950’s in the United States, the potential usefulness of appraisal as a toll for motivation and development was gradually recognized and the general model of Performance Appraisal as it is known today began from that time.

Despite the introduction of performance appraisals in other parts of the world, teachers in Zambia were not appraised during the colonial government they were just promoted based on experience and seniority. Seniority refers to relative length of service in the same job and in the same organization (Rodgers, 1986). A system of performance appraisals was introduced during United Independence Party (UNIP) to improve the promotion system and appraisal of teachers. The Annual Confidential Reporting System was the first to be used where a head-teacher sat in his or her office and appraised the teachers alone without involvement of the teacher. Late, in the 1980’s government acknowledged that, Civil Service Annual Confidential Reporting System on individual performance was just a matter of routine serving little purpose (Cabinet Office, 2014).

After the Annual Confidential Form failed to deliver results and there was loss of creditability of the Annual Confidential Reporting system, efforts to develop and introduce new instruments for measuring performance management systems was realized. The Annual Performance Appraisal System was introduced in 1993 when Movement for Multi-party Democracy (MMD) government was trying to improve employee performance in civil service. The Performance Appraisal Form is still currently in use (Republic of Zambia, 2003).

1.1 Ministry of Education, Science, Vocational Training and Education (MOESVTEE) in Kabwe District.

Kabwe District is located in Zambian Central Province. Kabwe is the capital city of Central Province which is divided into 11 Districts. It has an estimated population of 202,914 at 2010 census. The District has 51schools i.e. 15 secondary schools and 36 primary schools. In addition, 2 primary school and 3 secondary schools are grant aided whereas 34 primary schools and 12 secondary schools are government. Kabwe District has about 2700 teachers on its pay roll system; most of them are female teachers. Kabwe District has the District Education Board Secretary (DEBS) Office and the Provincial Education Officer (PEO) Office located within the city. (Kabwe District Education Board Secretary, 2014). Teachers in Kabwe District are suspicious and complain about the way promotions are conducted in the District resulting in low morale and motivation among teachers.

1.2 Statement of the problem

Promotion is a critical element of employee motivation. It is a form of incentive for rewarding exceptional performance. There is growing concern of how employees are rewarded by way of promotions in the MOESVTEE in Kabwe District. Some teachers complain that, undeserving teachers are the ones that get promoted at the expense of other hardworking (Frustrated teacher, 2013). This has led many to say that the performance appraisal system which is supposed to serve a lot of purposes in an employee’s life does not avail much to the teachers in Kabwe District.

The purpose of this research was to assess the effectiveness of performance appraisals with regard to promotions in the MOESVTEE in Kabwe District.

1.3 Research questions

1. How effective are the performance appraisals in promotion practices in the MOESVTEE?
2. What is the impact of promotion practices on teacher’s performance?
3. What is the perception of teachers of the performance appraisals with regard to promotions practices in MOESVTEE?

1.4.0 Main objective of the research

The purpose of the research was to assess the effectiveness of performance appraisals with regard to promotion practices in MOESVTEE in Kabwe District.

1.4.1 Research specific objectives of the research

1. To ascertain the effectiveness of the performance appraisals in promotion practices in the MOESVTEE.
2. To assess the impact of promotion practices on teachers performance.
3. To establish teachers perception of performance appraisal on promotion practices in the MOESVTEE.

1.5 The scope of the research

The research was limited to teachers in primary and secondary schools in Kabwe District. The main variables of the research were effort, ability, performance and role perception. The data was collected of the period 2011 to 2013.

1.6 The significance of the research

It is hoped that the research will provide evidence regarding the effectiveness of performance appraisal with regard to promotion practices to the policy makers in the MOESVTEE and Teaching Service Commission in which policy shifts could be considered.

The research was embarked on with the hope of providing plausible evidence to the Ministry associated with performance appraisals to promotion practices in order to promote transparency and accountability.

The research is anticipated to enable MOESVTEE to develop a model that will identify promotion practices that should be implemented within the Ministry in order to eliminate inequity.

1.7 Key Concepts of the research

Abilities: are personal characteristics used in performing the job (John et al., 2001).

Assessment: is the collection of relevant information that may be relied on for making decisions (Fenton, 1996).

Effectiveness: is the ability to achieve set goals and objectives. It also has to do with the actual impact of service and the quality of service rendered. Effectiveness also explains the commitment that is premised on a work ethos and the will to achieve, as well as a sense of self-efficacy, motivation and initiative (Productivity South Africa, 2007).

Effort: refers to the amount of energy used by an individual in performing the task (John et al., 2001).

Performance: refers to the degree of accomplishment of the task that makes up an employee’s job (Lloyd et al., 2004).

Performance appraisal: is a measurement of how well someone performs job-relevant tasks (Parrill, 1999).

Promotion: is an advancement of an employee to better job, better in terms of greater responsibilities, more prestige or status, greater skill and specially increased rate of salary (Pagers and Myers, 1971).

Role perception: refers to the direction in which individuals believe they should channel their efforts on the job (John et al., 2001).

1.8. Outline of the chapters

Chapter one of the research, provides an introduction to the study. It includes background on the performance appraisal with regard to promotions, a problem statement of the research, research questions and objectives, the scope and the limitation of the research and significance of the research. The chapter further includes the key concepts of the research.

Chapter two mainly deals with the literature review based on distinguished opinions and reviews from various sources, different researchers and authors whose work is significant and relevant to the research. Any literature relevant to the description of assessment of effectiveness of performance appraisals with regard to promotion was discussed. The chapter brings out what other researchers and authors perspective on the independent variables of the research i.e. effort, ability, performance and role perception.

Chapter three addresses the theoretical and conceptual framework that look at the assessment of effectiveness of performance appraisals with regard to promotion. The chapter discusses two theories i.e. the Adam Stacy’s Equity Theory of motivation and Victor Vroom’s Expectancy theory.

Chapter four discusses the research design and methodology used to collect data and how such data is analyzed. The most appropriate research methods and the research strategy within which data is collected and analyzed are discussed. The other aim of the chapter is to establish a golden thread for the data analysis chapter.

Chapter five presents data analysis of the research. In the process of analyzing data, the chapter explores whether the performance appraisals are effective and efficient with regard to promotion. The chapter also identifies the impact of promotion practices on teacher performance and the teacher’s perception of performance appraisals. The analysis is based on the data collected through various methods that are established in Chapter four.

Chapter six outlined the discussion and interpretation of research results.

Chapter seven showed the conclusion and recommendations of the research study. This section begins with a summary of the main findings and ends with references.

1.9 Summary

This chapter has provided the background of the research, reviewing promotions, the types of promotion and how promotions are conducted in the MOESTVEE of Kabwe District, the history of the performance appraisals, MOESTVEE in Kabwe District, defined the problem statement, the research questions, the scope of the research, the significance of the research, key concepts and lastly the outline of the chapters.

CHAPTER TWO

LITERATURE REVIEW

2.0 Introduction

The chapter reviews literature of different scholars, about evidence on the assessment of the effectiveness of Performance Appraisal with regard to promotion. The chapter also analyses the four variables and discusses what different scholars have documented in relation to promotion.

2.1 Promotions

Promotion: refers to the assignment of an employee to a higher position with greater duties, challenges, responsibilities, and more authority (Noe et al., 2011). Promotions benefit both the organization and employees. Promotions appear to be the most important form of pay for performance in most organizations, especially in hierarchical, white-collar firms. They are the primary means by which workers can increase their long-run compensation (McCue, 1992; Lazear, 1992). Promotions are usually given to the best performers (Medoff and Abraham, 1980, 1981; Gibbs, 1993). Therefore, promotions should generate substantial motivation in many settings. Moreover, there often does not seem to be strong pay for performance within jobs, which only increases the apparent importance of promotions for organizational incentives (Hedström, 1987).

Promotions have generated a great deal of theoretical interests, especially in the context of tournament models (Lazear and Rosen, 1981). However, this literature is still incomplete and somewhat stylized, making it difficult to link the theories to empirical work. Promotions are often seen as the prize of a tournament in which several coworkers compete for a limited number of slots (Lazear and Rosen, 1981).

Promotion decisions are of the utmost importance to organizations and some employees (London and Stumpf, 1986). From an organizational point of view, the quality of future management depends upon the quality of promotion decisions (London and Stumpf, 1986). Promoting the best people will allow the company to preserve its competitive advantage through competent people who are skilled at making strategic decisions. From an employee point of view, promotions offer individuals tangible and intangible rewards e.g., status, power, compensation, challenging work, responsibility, etc. and are hence a powerful source of motivation and satisfaction (Campbell et al., 1970; Igbaria and Greenhaus, 1992; Rosenbaum, 1984). The presence of career paths leading to a series of promotions and new positions also represents an important extrinsic reward for employees (Rhodes and Doering, 1983). Thus, opportunities for career advancement are a relevant and critical part of organizations incentive and reward systems (Bardwick, 1986).

As in many other professions (Rabore and Travers 2000), promotion of teachers is directly linked to an incremental remuneration structure based on hierarchical job groups which determine upward mobility. Wong and Wong (2010), observe that, teacher promotion is an important issue particularly because pay levels in education unlike in the business world are relatively fixed leaving promotion as an important reward tool through which teachers can strive to meet standards set by their employers.

Although promotion is a complex issue that may depend on many factors simultaneously, motivational factor is the most dominant outcome. Through promotion, teachers are enabled to find roles which satisfy them at different positions in the job hierarchy reversing possibilities of negative reaction mechanism when teachers are dissatisfied with their current job positions.

2.1.1 Empirical Evidence on Promotions

A study on secondary school teachers’ satisfaction in Transkei, South Africa (Mwamwenda, 2000) found no significant difference between respondents when salary was used as the criteria of satisfaction. There was however a significant difference when promotion was used as the criterion. A similar research done in Eastern Cape of South Africa (Mwamwenda, 2004) made similar observation with 48% satisfaction and 52% dissatisfaction when salary was used as the criterion for satisfaction. More teachers were however, for the view of dissatisfaction on using promotion as the criterion of satisfaction compared to salary. They felt that the process of promotion was not fair.

2.2 Promotions as Incentives

It is worth considering why firms might use promotions for incentives. Individualistic schemes, especially ones that do not depend on job assignments, allow more flexibility in providing incentives. In other words, promotions are often used to achieve two goals simultaneously that, in principle might be separated: putting employees in the right jobs, and generating motivation. In words promotions are as having two functions: to sort employees by ability, and to provide incentives for effort (Mirrlees, 1974). Thus, it is not immediately obvious why promotions should be used as incentives (Gibbs, 1994).

The idea of using promotions as an incentive device is closely linked to the theory of tournaments. Tournament theory states that, “a firm can motivate employees by having them compete for a reward” (a promotion) (Gibbs, 1994, p.493). Tournament models of promotion take Lazear and Rosen's (1981), rank-order tournament model as their starting point. Here, two players compete for a promotion (which implies an increase in wages) and only the person with the higher output wins it. In their model, effort is unobservable and output depends on effort and a random component. They show that, there exists a wage gap that will induce the first-best level of effort. Other papers that studied promotion tournaments include Malcolmson (1984), Rosen (1986), and Baker et al., (1988).

Lastly, in this extremely competitive corporate world, promotion can be used as one of the tools for competing firms in tracing the most productive participant of one organization to be worth hiring for other different organization (Bernhardt and Scoones, 1993). In such a way the promotion highlights am employee in the external environment and realizes his worth in the internal environment. According to Carmichael (1983), promotion enhances the yield of an organization when an employee climbs a promotion ladder on the basis of his seniority and resultantly he gets an increased wage rate. However, according to Baker et al., (1988), promotion does not consider to be an incentive device, thus the optimal results cannot be generated by promoting the employee in the organization. There is a more failure rate when the employees are hired externally than when they are promoted internally (Kelly-Radford, 2001).

2.2.1 Empirical Evidence of Promotion as Incentives

Fairburn and Malcolmson (1994), in a research model a case where the firm would like to sort employees into different jobs. They note that it is generally a manager who reports on employees' performance and recommends bonuses, and that these managers may be susceptible to 'influence activities' on the part of employees that may make the promotions inefficient in the sense that, more employees could be promoted than would be optimal. However, if promotions are used in conjunction with bonuses to sort employees into different jobs, then even when influence is possible, effort will be increased. Research papers that study promotions as sorting devices highlight either learning or human capital acquisition as the way of adding dynamics to the promotion process (Gibbons and Waldman, 1999).

Gibbs' (1989), extends the Lazear and Rosen (1981), basic tournament model to multi-person tournaments, and incorporates the use of an internal hierarchy in the firm to sort employees according to ability. The paper shows that in a multi-person tournament with heterogeneous agents competing for a series of promotions, employees with higher ability tend to be promoted, so employees sort into ranks according to ability, and that promotions can provide both efficient sorting and effort incentives. Furthermore, the number of competitors and the distribution of skills amongst employees, as well as the wage differentials at different ranks, all have an important influence on effort incentives. Gibbs' model is expounded in two further papers, Gibbs (1990), which compares tournaments and standards, and Gibbs (1991), which details more carefully the incentive effect for employees with varying ability.

Gibbs (1995), uses the same personnel data as Baker et al., (1993), along with performance ratings, and focuses his study on middle managers. He finds that both promotions and bonuses are used as incentives in this firm, and that employees that are repeatedly passed over for promotion have greatly reduced incentives. Furthermore, he provides evidence that, promotion incentives affect behaviour; stronger incentives lead to greater improvements in qualitative performance indicators.

2.3 Types of Promotion

Promotion is one of the best forms of incentives which generate a sense of loyalty among employees toward the organization and keep the employees busy in investing their sincere efforts. Promotion is defined as an upward advancement of an employee in an organization to another job, which commands better pay/wages, better status, higher opportunities/challenges, responsibility and authority, better working environment, a higher rank etc. (Pigors and Myers, 1971). Most of the organisations do promotion on the basis of merit, seniority, educational qualification, experiences and training courses attended. Different types of promotions are as following:

- Multiple chain promotions: Such promotions identify multi-promotional opportunities and they exist at each position in the organization (Yoder and Dale, 1972).
- Up or Out promotions: Any situation in which an employee must either be promoted or terminated within a specific time period is considered as up or out promotion. This situation occurs at most universities, where the junior faculty either achieves tenure or leaves (Yoder and Dale, 1972).
- Dry promotions: Dry promotions are those, which are given in lieu of increases in compensation that is when all compensation is adjusted upward to keep pace with the cost of living (Yoder and Dale, 1972).

Thus, through promotion, an employee gets encouragement and an organization gets the best man or woman available (Yoder and Dale, 1972).

The principle of promotion can be merit, ability and potential or it may be seniority or experience. Instead of using these two types separately, a combination of both of them may be regarded as an effective basis of promotion.

Promotion on merit is adopted by many organizations as a way of motivating their employees to perform better. It is seen as a fair method of rewarding those whose performance is considered exemplary and in the process encourages everyone to strive and perform better.

Merit-based promotions refer to non-monetary rewards through which an organization tangibly signals its appreciation of quality work and achievements (Lawler, 1986). Rewarding employees based on their performance enhances firm performance (Lawler, 1986). Agarwal and Ferratt, (1999) found that, high-performance organizations persistently sought to recognize and reinforce valuable contributions made by employees.

Promotions can be seniority based. Seniority is the length of time that an individual has served in a job or worked for an organization (Rodgers, 1986). Seniority can bring higher status, rank, or precedence to an employee who has served an organization for a longer period of time. There is controversy as to what should be the criteria for based on promotion seniority or ability. Trade unions prefer seniority while management prefers ability or merit. Unions demand seniority as a basis of promotion because lay-offs, recalls and discharges are frequently based on seniority.

2.3.1 Empirical Evidence on the types of Promotion

A research conducted by (Rupia et al., 2012), on perception of civil servants toward Promotion on Merit. The civil servants on overall had positive perception towards promotion on merit based on, promotion increases motivation and teamwork. It was thus concluded that when promotion is conducted in fairness, it motivates the employees and enhances teamwork.

In the study by university of California (2004), the employment history of farm workers were studied” as well as agricultural businesses that used seniority only based promotional systems. The study determined that there are several advantages to using seniority promotion systems, these advantages included the employee gaining valuable experience and knowledge as they work and are promoted. This provided the employee stays employed and vacancies occur for the employee to be promoted.

2.4 Importance of Promotions to employees and organisations

A promotion is viewed as desirable by employees because of the impact a promotion has on pay, authority, responsibility, and the ability to influence broader organizational decision making. A promotion raises the status of the employee who receives a promotion which is a visible sign of esteem from the employer (Yoder and Dale, 1972).

A promotion is a form of recognition for employees who make significant and effective work contributions. Consequently, a dilemma arises in organizations since repeated promotions generally place an employee in a management role. Employers are challenged to provide alternative career paths for employees who deserve the benefits and recognition provided by a promotion, but do not aspire to manage the work of other employees (Yoder and Dale, 1972). Individual contributors must be eligible for promotions that recognize and reward their role as contributors.

A promotion is a powerful communication tool about what is valued within an organization. Thus, a promotion must be available to employees who play any role in the contribution of work and value.

Robbins maintains that promotions provide opportunities for personal growth, increased responsibility, and increased social status (Robbins, 2003).

It was also noted that, promotion enhanced employee performance thus increasing organizational commitment (Markham et al., 1987). Employees are sensitive to quality variations in performance appraisal as its processes are a powerful determinant of employees’ futures such as having promotion, rewards, demotion or even termination of their job within the organization (Mayer and Davis, 1999). Thayer (1987), suggested performance appraisal quality variations will generate strong reactions among employees.

In addition, promotion decisions could be decided under other criteria or administrative rules different from performance, such as loyalty, influence, favoritism, personal relationships, or by privileging the relationship between co-workers by creating an “equal-opportunity” environment (Milgram, 1988).

Some companies may even have a tendency to overvalue unfamiliar candidates and undervalue know ones. Prendergast and Topel (1996), suggest that, as firms usually rely on subjective supervisors’ judgments of employees’ performance when selecting the potential candidates to promote, there is always a door open to favoritism (evaluators acting on personal preferences toward subordinates) or bribes: if so, the cost of favoritism may come on the form of arbitrary rewards and less productive job assignments. In the absence of verifiability of performance and “principal-agent” contracts, such as output-related compensations, these practices are more likely to emerge.

2.5 Impact of promotion on job satisfaction and performance

It is the general understanding that job satisfaction is an attitude towards job. In other words job satisfaction is an affective or emotional response toward various facets of one’s job. A person with a high level of job satisfaction holds positive attitudes towards his or her job, while a person who is dissatisfied with his or her job holds negative attitudes about the job.

Luthans (1985), quotes a comprehensive definition given by Locke. A pleasurable or positive emotional state resulting from the appraisal of one’s job or job experience. Job satisfaction is a result of employees’ perception of how well their job provides those things which are viewed as important. As Robbins (1993), put it, when people speak of employee attitudes, they often mean job satisfaction. Job satisfaction, like any attitude, is generally acquired over a period of time as an employee gains more and more information about the workplace. Job satisfaction is also defined as reintegration of affect produced by individual’s perception of fulfillment of his needs in relation to his work and the surrounding it (Saiyaden, 1993). Organ and Hammer (1991), pointed out that job satisfaction represents a complex assemblage of cognition, emotion and tendencies. Nguyen et al., (2003), concluded that, job satisfaction is the result of promotion opportunities in the organization. In literature, it is evidenced that there is a relationship between job satisfaction and performance of employees.

There are a number of factors that influence job satisfaction. The major ones can be summarized by recalling the dimensions of job satisfaction. They are pay, the work itself, promotions, supervision, workgroup, and working conditions (Luthans, 1985).

Further, job satisfaction has significant managerial implications. If the job satisfaction is high, the employees will perform better. On the other hand if the job satisfaction is low, there will be performance problems. Teseema and Soeters (2006), also discovered that there was a positive relationship between promotion practices and perceived performance of employee. The finding of Sajuyigbe et al., (2013), agreed with other researchers, that many people experience satisfaction when they believe that their future prospects are good.

Performance is defined as a function of individual ability and skill and effort in a given situation (Porter and Lawler, 1974). In other word, employee’s skills and abilities are relatively stable. Therefore, for the purpose of the research, performance is defined as effort extended to the job of an employee.

Motivation for Performance - When certain specifiable conditions exist, reward systems have been demonstrated to motivate performance (Gerhart and Milkovich, 1992; Lawler, 1990; Lawler, 1971; Vroom, 1964). The conditions for motivation of performance are that, important rewards must be perceived to be tied in a timely fashion to effective performance. Organizations get the kind of behavior that, leads to the rewards their employee`s value. This occurs because people have their own needs and mental maps of what the world is like. They use these maps to choose those behaviours that lead to outcomes that satisfy their needs. Therefore they are inherently neither motivated nor unmotivated to perform effectively; performance motivation depends on the situation, how it is perceived, and the needs of people. The approach that can best help us understand how people develop and act on their mental maps is called expectancy theory (Vroom, 1964; Lawler, 1973). Three concepts serve as the key building blocks of the theory.

A. Performance-Outcome Expectancy: Every, behaviour has associated with it, in an individual's mind, certain outcomes (rewards or punishments). In other words, individuals believe or expect that if they behave in a certain way, they will get certain things.

B. Attractiveness: Each outcome has attractiveness to a specific individual. Outcomes have different attractiveness for different individuals. This is true because outcome values result from individual’s needs and perceptions, which differ because they reflect other factors in an individual's life. For example, some individuals may value an opportunity for promotion or advancement because of their needs for achievement or power, while others may not want to be promoted and leave their current work group because of needs for affiliation with others. Similarly, recognition, such as a senior teacher at primary school, may have great value to some, but little for others.

C. Effort-Performance Expectancy: Each, behaviour also has associated with it, a certain expectancy or probability of success. This expectancy represents the individual's perception of how hard it will be to achieve such behaviour and the probability of his or her successful achievement of the behaviour. For example, employees may have a strong expectancy (e.g., ten-ninety) that if they put forth the effort, they can produce ten units an hour, but that they only have a fifty-fifty chance of producing fifteen units an hour if they try.

Putting these concepts together, it is possible to make a basic statement about motivation. In general, an individual's motivation to behave in a certain way is greatest when:

1. The individual believes that, the behaviour will lead to certain outcomes (performance- outcome expectancy).
2. The individual feels that, the outcomes are attractive.
3. The individual believes that, performance at a desired level is possible (effort-performance expectancy)

The relationship between job satisfaction and performance has been critically assessed in a variety of organizational settings. Results of these studies have been mixed. Cummings (1970), identified three major points of view concerning this relationship. Satisfaction causes performance, performance causes satisfaction and rewards cause both performance and satisfaction. All of these three views are supported by various researches.

2.5.1 Empirical Evidence on impact of promotion on job satisfaction

Mirvis and Lawer (1977), in their research produced conclusive findings about the relationship between job satisfaction and performance. In attempting to measure the performance of bank tellers in terms of cash shortages, their proposed arguments are satisfied tellers were less likely to show shortages and less likely to leave their jobs.

Kornhanuser and Sharp (1976), in their research have conducted more than thirty studies to identify the relationship between satisfaction and performance in industrial sector. Many of the studies have found that, a positive relationship existed between job satisfaction and performance.

Katzell, et al., (1952), in their research demonstrated that, job satisfaction was associated neither with turnover nor with quality of production.

Smith and Cranny (1968), in their research reviewed the literature and concluded that, satisfaction is associated with performance as well as effort, commitment and intention.

David et al., (1970), in their research suggested that, the type of reward system under which workers perform strongly influence the satisfaction performance relationship.

Neuman (1989), in a research found that, employees develop and perform better if managers control and motivate their employees with participative forms of rewards.

In the 1991 survey of American workers that, investigated 16 aspects of work, respondents reported more satisfaction with such facets as being able to work independently, having interesting work, and enjoying an opportunity to learn new skills (Spector, 1997). Most scales of job satisfaction (Hackman and Oldham, 1975; Herzberg, 1987; Smith et al., 1969; Spector, 1997) include such facets as the nature of work, promotion opportunities, and social relations.

Velnampy (2008), in his research on job attitude and employees performance concluded that, job satisfaction contains positive influence on the performance of the employees as it enhances job involvement and the higher performance also makes people feel more satisfied and committed to the organization. The satisfaction and performance of the employee works in a cycle and are interdependent. Job satisfaction and involvement of the employee leads him to have high levels of performance.

Shahu and Gole (2008), in their research define effects of job satisfaction on performance, they had sum up their findings on a factor that work satisfaction should be considered by the organization as important plan which needs to be extend in order to improve employees performance and where employees can put their best performance. Performance level lowers with lower level satisfaction scores. There should be some awareness programs, pertaining to the stress and satisfaction level in the industries. It will help organizations to understand the benefits of stress knowledge in relation to satisfaction and goal achievement in the industry.

There are only a few research papers estimating the impact of promotions on overall job satisfaction. Using data from the 1989 and 1990 waves of the NLSY, Pergamit and Veum (1989), in a research found a positive correlation between promotions and job satisfaction.

De Souza (2002), in a research estimates the effect of promotions on worker satisfaction, focusing on promotion satisfaction in a small sample of managers. De Souza finds that, managers who received a promotion are more satisfied with promotion opportunities and have greater promotion expectations for the future. De Souza also considers other aspects of employee satisfaction, but does not analyze overall job satisfaction.

2.6 Employee Effort and Promotion

Effort is an internal force of a person which makes him or her to work willingly when employees are satisfied with their job and their needs are met, they develop an attachment to work or we say that they make an effort to perform better. Increased effort results in better performances. Effort, which results from being motivated, refers to the amount of energy (physical and / or mental) an individual uses in performing a task (John et al., 200, p121). A person is motivated to the degree that he or she believes that (a) effort will lead to acceptable performance (expectancy). "The relationship between Effort and Performance is known as the E-P linkage" (Isaac, 2001, p.212). "The expectancy component of expectancy theory is the belief that one's effort (E), will give the expected performance (P) goal" (Scholl, 2002, p.30). Expectancy is slated as the first component of the VIE theory (Vroom, 1964); illustrating that in order for a person to be effectively motivated, that individual needs to perceive that their personal expenditure of effort will result in an acceptable level of performance.

Expectancy can be described as the belief that higher or increased effort will yield better performance (Vroom, 1964). This can be explained by the thinking of: "If I work harder, I will make something better". Scaffolding upon some of Vroom's original work, (Porter and Lawler, 1974, p.20), developed a theoretical model suggesting, that the expenditure or an individual's energy or efforts will be determined by the level of expectations that a specific outcome may be obtained and the degree to which that outcome is valued by someone (Pinder, 1984, p.16). Expectations are influenced by incentives and rewards.

An Employee should feel that the efforts that he/she would like to put into work would yield the desired results. It is ultimately a question of how confident one feels about oneself. A self-proclaimed achiever may be immensely confident of the ability to perform astoundingly high, while a skeptic may have an entirely different perspective. An employee who feels that the efforts will not yield the desired results, in terms of achieving the set targets, will have a low probability of expectancy. Probability of an event can assume values between 0 and 1. How well an employee scores on this scale of confidence will have a direct bearing on the employee's level of motivation (Iyer, 2009, p.1).

2.6.1 Empirical evidence on Effort and Promotion

Ivana et al., (2009), in a research found that, reward practice must satisfied a full and open transparency regarding awards, the communication of the availability of the rewards, the criteria to be satisfied, and the identification of the award recipients.

Porter et al., (1975), in research states that, the reward process as being transparent should be demonstrated by the clarity of the link between the extra effort and the reward being given. There are also concerns with the way rewards are administered within the reward system by suggesting that, in order to acquire positive motivational properties, the distributed incentive scheme rewards made by organizations have to be performance-dependent based.

According to Janssen (2001), empirically those managers who perceived the effort reward fairness perform better than managers who perceive they are unfairly rewarded. Provision of opportunities for promotion makes employees experience satisfaction because they feel a sense of achievement if they move from one level of experience to another and because it shows professional growth. Promotional opportunities also play a major role in an employee‘s development because an employee develops personally and professionally as he or she climbs the ladder of success.

Porter and Lowler (1969), in their research suggested that, satisfaction will affect a worker’s effort, arguing that increased satisfaction from performance possibility helps to increase expectations of performance leading to rewards.

Carroll et al., (1964), in their research found that, satisfaction and productivity are crucial relationship in which each affects the other. They suggest that, performance leads to more effort because of high perceived expectancy. The effort leads to effective performance, which again leads to satisfaction in crucial relationship.

2.7 Employee Ability and Promotion

Abilities are personal characteristics used in performing a job (John et al., 2001, p.121). Abilities usually do not fluctuate widely over short periods of time. The ability component of potential highlights the core set of talents and skills that an employee will need to excel in a more senior, more critical job. This includes the capacity to:

-Process complex ideas
-Think logically
-Perceive and understand others’ emotions
-Learn new skills (e.g., an employee’s technical, functional, or interpersonal skills)

Deeprose (1994, p.3), was of the view that, “Good managers recognize people by doing things that, acknowledge their accomplishments and they reward people by giving them something tangible.” Fair chances of promotion according to employee’s ability and skills make employee more loyal to their work and become a source of pertinent workability for the employee. Bull (2005), hypothesized a view that, “when employees experience success in mentally challenging occupations which allows them to exercise their skills and abilities, they experience greater levels of job satisfaction.” Employees are definitely closer to their organization as their job can become the major satisfaction in their life after having a proper rewards and promotions at their job. Ali and Ahmed (2009), verified that, there is a statistically significant relationship between reward, promotions and satisfaction.

2.7.1 Empirical Evidence on Employee Ability and Promotion

In a study done by Gatewood and Field (2001), on aptitude testing showed that, aptitude testing should also be positively related to promotion and raises. A review of review of longitudinal studies of aptitude test scores by Schmidt and Hunter (2004), found that, aptitude predicted both movement in job hierarchy and income.

In addition, because of the majority of previous research, Hough and Oswald (2000), Schmidt and Hunter (1998), (2004), Viswesvaran and Ones (2002), did a research where they found a positive relation between scores on aptitude tests and job performance, this outcome is expected to be consistent for a long term measure of job performance. Due to inter-relations that, takes place between job performance, promotions and salary.

2.8 Employee Performance and Promotion

Performance refers to the degree of accomplishment of the task that makes up an employee’s job (Llydle and Rue, 2003, p.251). Performance is what the organization hires one to do, and do well” (Campbell et al., 1993). Thus, performance is not defined by the action itself but by judgemental and evaluative processes (Ilgen and Schneider, 1991; Motowidlo et al., 1997). Moreover, only actions which can be scaled, i.e., measured, are considered to constitute performance (Campbell et al., 1993). Shahzad, (2008) and Teseema and Soeters (2006), established a significant positive relationship between employee performance and promotion practices. Promotion leads to higher employee performance (Guest, 2002; Park et al., 2003). Teseema and Soeters, (2006), found significantly positive correlation between promotion practices and perceived employee performance, however human resource outcomes was used as mediating variable.

Vroom interpreted promotional opportunity as a desired positive personal goal (Vroom, 1982). He stated that promotional opportunity is a goal most workers desire and that an individual's performance is related to the degree to which the individual believes that being promoted is related to performance on the job and how strongly the individual desires the promotion. Vroom found considerable evidence in related literature to suggest that promotional opportunities are important to a worker's satisfaction with the job (Vroom, 1982). Vroom explained that, job satisfaction is directly related to the extent that jobs provide individuals with rewarding outcomes. If a worker believes that achievement of organizational goals will lead to such personal rewards as promotion, then whether or not these rewards occur is likely to affect the worker's job satisfaction. Schneider et al., (1992) also stated that, promotional opportunity is important to job satisfaction. They wrote, "Employees who perceive few opportunities for advancement have negative attitudes toward their work and their organizations" (Schneider et al., 1992).

Herzberg (1986), stated that, providing employees with opportunities to advance in their company through internal promotions acts as a motivator related to work. Simon and Enz (1995), and Wiley (1997), found that, promotion and advancement opportunity to be among the best tools to motivate employees.

Riketta and Dick (2005), suggested that behaviour of employees in the workplace is related to satisfaction in their careers. Empirical research by Harrison and Novak (2006), showed that, efforts by management to establish promotion opportunities contributes to employee’s job satisfaction and acts as a motivator for job performance.

2.8.1 Empirical evidence on employee performance and promotion

There have been two meta-analyses of the job satisfaction-job performance relationship. Petty et al., (1984), in their research provided a limited meta-analysis of the job satisfaction-job performance relationship. These authors confined their analyses to 16 studies that were published in five journals from 1964 to 1983 and that included a measure of overall job satisfaction. Correcting the correlations for unreliability in job satisfaction and job performance Petty et al., (1984), reported a mean corrected correlation of .31 between the constructs. In interpreting their results Petty et al., concluded, "The results of the present study indicate that the relationship between individual, overall job satisfaction and individual job performance is stronger and more consistent than that reported in previous reviews" (p. 719). Despite the fact that the results of this study reveal a stronger satisfaction-performance relationship than had been suggested by qualitative reviews, and perhaps because of the limited scope of the meta-analysis, this correlation is rarely cited by those currently investigating the satisfaction-performance relationship.

At about the same time as the Petty et al., (1984), review laffaldano and Muchinsky (1985), conducted a more comprehensive meta-analysis of the job satisfaction-job performance literature. Meta-analyzing 217 correlations from 74 studies, they found a substantial range in satisfaction-performance correlations across the job satisfaction facets, ranging from a mean "true score" correlation of .06 for pay satisfaction to .29 for overall job satisfaction. For their primary analysis, laffaldano and Muchinsky averaged the facet-performance correlations and reported an average true score correlation of .17 between job satisfaction and job performance. In discussing their findings, the authors only made reference to the .17 correlation, concluding that job satisfaction and job performance were "only slightly related to each other" (p. 269).

2.9 Role perception and promotion

Role refers to responsibility, obligation or expected behavior attached to any social position (Ekong 1988, p.85). Perception is a process by which people select, organize and interpret sensory stimulation into a meaningful and coherent picture of the world. It is a process which gets structured, organized and modified as the individual matures (Norman et al., 1982). Role perception can have a definite impact on performance (Gibson et al., 1982).

A study by Child (1972), has shown the influence of role perception of extension workers in determining actions. A workers perception of the organizational goals is his or her estimates of the region into which he or she thinks the order of the organization would like things to move (Oyedijo, 1983). Unfavorable outcomes from the organizational goals probably due to low role perception may lower the level of aspiration and satisfaction of an employee and thereby, creating conflict between him or her and the organization (Banmeke and Ajayi, 2005).

Vroom (1982), considered compensation to be an important variable in job satisfaction and included high pay in his description of the key elements of most satisfying work roles. He also stated that “the worker's perception of the fairness of compensation is more important than the actual amount received”. Vroom contended that, individuals are guided by a moral system which has as a basic tenet the fair distribution of rewards. If a worker receives less than is perceived fair, the worker considers that an injustice has been done. If the worker perceives that more is received than has been earned, the worker feels guilty. To Vroom, job satisfaction is a function of the difference between the amount of reward a person believes should be received and the amount the person actually receives.

Employers often wish to know whether the factors used in promoting employees do in fact allow them to promote the most qualified applicants. Because the performance of those not promoted is not observed, sample-promotion bias is a likely problem in any attempt to "validate" employee-promotion criteria.

[...]

• Course: Human Resource Mangement
• Author: Lillian Nsalamu Lialabi (Author)
• Publication Year: 2014
• Pages: 117
• Catalog Number: V469445
• ISBN (eBook): 9783668938199
• ISBN (Book): 9783668938205
• Language: English
• Tags: kabwe, district