Edition 37, Human Resources

Supervisor Ratings of Job Performance: A Look to Increasing Effectiveness

By: David J. Woehr
The University of North Carolina Charlotte

Sylvia G. Roch
State University of New York at Albany

A positive trend in recent selection and assessment research is an increased focus on multiple aspects of job performance. Specifically, job relevant performance has expanded beyond job specific task behavior to include other components such as organizational citizenship behavior, counterproductive work behavior, and adaptive behavior. Yet a key question in the literature focuses on the best way to assess and measure the different aspects of performance. On the surface this would seem a simple matter. How hard can it be to differentiate and assess levels of job performance across employees? In fact, most managers as well as researchers would agree that identifying and collecting relevant, psychometrically sound, and practical measures of job performance is a significant challenge.

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Edition 37, Human Resources

Efficiency in the “Bring a Friend to Work” Recruitment Process

By: Lorenzo Rivarés
Director of the Center for Selection and Employment at Grupo Eulen, Madrid

Managing personal relationships in the business world has always been a key aspect of human resources management. Some companies forbid their employees from having personal ties to one another, while others refrain from regulating this aspect, saying it is a private matter that concerns the individual as a person more than as an employee; and still others encourage such relationships and take advantage of them to make their processes more efficient. For example, some companies compensate their employees with a referral bonus when they recruit other professionals to work in the company. Employee referral systems, whether compensated or not, have long been popular among companies, and sometimes have results contrary to what are expected.

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Edition 36, Human Resources

Stubborn…, but not so much: Resistance to Change

By: Luis Arciniega

How many people do you know that follow the same route to go from their home to their work place? Or that despite the fact that they renew their wardrobe frequently it seems that they always wear the same clothes? Or those that when they are informed that to make a process in their company a new procedure has been implemented, immediately get furious regardless of the fact that the change will save time and work? Certainly more than one person close to you shows this kind of behavior. However, it is curious that if you start thinking about their ages, they will be people that need more than two puffs to blow out all the candles in their birthday cake; you will also be able to identify cases of individuals who never let go of their laptop and their handheld device to go everywhere and that nevertheless they frequently display the behavior described above. An interesting thought would be to start thinking about the common denominator that characterizes these persons: a personality trait? their genes? their education?

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