Evaluate the healthcare organization’s performance management system for effectiveness, drawing on the interviewee’s assessment and your own observations and conclusions.

Module 3: Evaluating Performance Management Systems

Depending on your experience in healthcare, and other fields as well, you may be familiar with a performance management system or primarily with one aspect of assessing performance, the annual performance review. As a critical distinction from the annual review, performance management goes beyond a list of skills to rate or expected behaviors to check off, to a larger consideration of goals to reach and specific improvement strategies to implement.

Gaining understanding and perspective on a nurse executive’s role in performance management is the purpose of this Module 3 Assignment. To help inform your thinking and both the opportunities and challenges of performance management, you will gain firsthand information through an interview with a nursing professional whose responsibilities include those you will assume as a nurse executive.

Follow the guidelines for this Assignment as provided in the overview documents. You are encouraged to give yourself adequate time to reflect on your interviewee’s responses, the better to support you in assuming this aspect of the work of a nurse executive.

To Prepare:

Review the Learning Resources on performance management for support in preparing for your interview with the human resources nurse manager.

Access and review the Performance Management System Interview Guidelines and Questions document for guidance on selecting a nurse executive to interview, and on planning, conducting, and analyzing the interview responses.

Note: You are required to complete and submit Page 2 of this Guidelines document in a Word file identified as “Interviewee Profile and Confirmation Signature.” Be sure to obtain the full signature of your nurse executive interviewee to confirm the individual’s participation. Initials and/or only first or last name are not sufficient.

Access and review the Performance Management System Interview Matrix Summary Template. Consider how you can use this matrix to help organize information and conclusions from your interview.

When you have completed the interview, reflect on the results, including background information on the professional, the healthcare organization, and performance management system. As needed, follow up with your interviewee by phone or e-mail to clarify answers and conclusions.

Assignment:

Part 1: Interview Matrix Summary

Complete the Performance Management System Interview Matrix Summary, provided with the Assessment materials, to create a visual summary of the information gathered through your interview with the nurse executive.

Part 2: Interview Reflection

In a separate Word document, write 2–3 pages that reflect on the interview and your overall impressions. Include the following points in your reflection:

· Briefly describe the professional you interviewed, including title, years of experience, and his/her healthcare organization (e.g., size, location, special services). Note: Be mindful of your interviewee’s privacy in the details you provide.

· Explain the concept of “performance management” that guided your interview and the interviewee’s responses.

· Evaluate the healthcare organization’s performance management system for effectiveness, drawing on the interviewee’s assessment and your own observations and conclusions.

· Describe characteristics and/or factors that stand out to you as contributing to the system’s strengths and weaknesses.

· Describe actions, strategies, or approaches that you would recommend to address weaknesses in the system.

Module 3 Assignment

Performance Management System Interview Matrix Summary

Complete this matrix to summarize information from your interview with a nurse executive on the performance management system for the individual’s healthcare organization. Identify the nurse executive’s unit/department that is the specific focus of your evaluation.

Characteristics/Factors	Performance Management System for [specify nursing unit]
System Features
Employee Evaluation Criteria
Sources of Evaluation Criteria
How Criteria Communicated to Employees
How Components of Performance Management Are Interconnected in the System
How Information Collected, Maintained, Consolidated, and Summarized on Employee Performance and Retention
Technology Integration in the System
Privacy Protections
System Analysis
How System Supports Employee Development
How System Supports Employee Retention
Use of Peer Reviews/ Multisource (360 degree) Feedback and Effectiveness
How Training Used to Enhance Employee Performance and Retention
How Training Used to Support Managers That Evaluate Performance
Mechanisms for Employee Input on the System
System Evaluation
How Well System Supports Employee Performance Growth and Development
How Well System Supports Employee Retention
Performance Management System Strengths
Performance Management System Weaknesses
Overall Conclusions