Performance Appraisal
A process used in most companies to evaluate employees' performance quality and decide on pay awards each year. In theory, performance appraisal is a valuable system for receiving information on obstacles to high-quality performance and for giving feedback to the employee on his or her work, procedure and outcomes. In practice many performance appraisal systems become politicized due the linkage of appraisal results and pay awards. More recently, in an effort to increment the value of the feedback element of the procedure, some companies have moved to 360-degree feedback programs and peer appraisal systems.