Employee Performance Appraisal in Hospital: Who, What, How and When?

Health care professional are becoming more involved in performance management as hospital restructure to increase effectiveness. Although they are hospital employees, they are subject to performance appraisals because the hospitals are accountable to patients and the community for the quality of hospital services. The purpose for having a performance appraisal program in hospital is to monitor employees’ performance, motivate staff and improve hospital morale. The performance of a health care professional may be appraised by the appropriate departmental manager, by other professionals in a team or program or by peers, based on prior agreement on expectations. Appraisal approaches vary. They include behavioural approaches such as rating scales, peer rating, ranking or nomination and outcome approaches such as management by objectives and goal setting. Professionals should give and receive timely feedback on a flexible schedule. Feedback can be provided one-on-one, by a group assessing quality of care or through an anonymous survey. The British Association of Medical Managers (BAMM, 1999) has defined appraisal as "the process of periodically reviewing one's performance against the various elements of one's job". This paper will describe the purpose & developmental criteria of an appraisal program that will regularly assess the performance of hospital employee.