Description
Request for Proposal
The Middle America School has engaged the services of your consulting firm to redesign their performance management system. They have requested a proposal from you detailing these procedures.
The report should be easy to read, clearly describe the performance management process, and relay your understanding of the job and organizational context. You are encouraged to use relevant literature citations as well. Lastly, you should write an “executive summary” that will preface your report. Click on the following link for more information on how to write a response to an RFP:
Request for Proposal
The Middle America School is asking for your help in managing the performance of their professors. This is a small liberal arts school in the Midwest that has over 20 undergraduate majors. Currently, professors are simply paid for how many classes they teach and how many students they advise. Middle America is seeking your advice because accreditation organizations have begun to notice that their graduates are having trouble finding jobs, and they suspect that the classroom content and advising may not be tied to job skills. Course evaluations are known to have strong bias and may not be a reflection of teaching ability (i.e., only dissatisfied students respond, more difficult classes have lower ratings, low response rates, etc.), so there may be some legal issues with including these. What type of system would you suggest, what sources would you include, how should it be implemented, and how will you manage the culture change of a new system?
Organizational Strategy:
- To be the best applied teaching school for the two most popular majors: Psychology & Business.
- To acquire other struggling smaller schools and apply Middle America’s standardized processes, both operational and academics, to do successful turn around management.
- To have a 90% employment or graduate school acceptance rate for graduates/graduating students.
Required Sections
- Executive Summary. Click on the following link for more information on how to write an Executive Summary: How to Write an Executive Summary.
Links to an external site. - Overview. Describe the purpose of system (how it will be used [developmental?], what decisions it will support [administrative?]) and how you will ensure alignment with the organization’s strategy.
- Job Analysis. Outline a plan for conducting job analyses, including SMEs and data collection methods, and how you will tie the development of the performance appraisal form to the job analysis. Include a sample job description in an appendix, not in the body of the proposal.
- The Appraisal Form. Please describe which type of appraisal format you will be using, e.g., type of rating scale, goal/objective setting. How will it be used and what is your justification for this type of form? Include an example of the appraisal tool itself. This is an example, not a full form. Please pick an appropriate KSA or competency for university professors and use it as an example to demonstrate what type of tool it is, how it will be used, and that you can produce a tool that is consistent with the methodology you have outlined in this report
- Process & Delivery. Describe the entire process for this performance management system for all stakeholders.
- Training. Outline a training plan for key stakeholders (raters, ratees, HR). How will you train different stakeholders and what should be different about their training?
- Legal Defensibility/Fairness. List and explain specific components of your system that enhance legal defensibility and promote procedural justice and fairness.
- Create a timeline that details the performance management process from beginning to end for both the rater and ratee, as well as when HR should be involved. Think about Aguinis’ (2009) performance management process.
- Decide who participates (is this a single rater or multiple rater system)?
- Who initiates the process and monitors progress?
- Are there formal meetings? Informal meetings? How is feedback delivered? Be sure to include your preferred method for providing feedback and coaching for performance improvement.
- What is HR’s role in the entire process?
- This process should also include details on:
- Conclusion. Summarize the main points of the proposal and the benefits of the system for the client.
- Reference Page. An APA-Style reference page corresponding to all in-line citations in the paper, which must include as a minimum the required readings from the course.
Note: a detailed budget does not need to be included for the purposes of this assignment. You will also be graded on clarity of writing. The report must be easy to read, written with proper grammar, and contain no spelling errors or misused words. The written report will be due on MONDAY of Unit 14. There are no length requirements, but keep in mind that all the topics referenced above must be addressed in the report.
Rubric
Your assignment will be graded according to the following rubric:Design of a Performance Management System Rubric
Download Design of a Performance Management System Rubric
Tips for the IO522 Capstone:
- The executive summary should serve as a standalone document. Therefore, it should be written with the thought that the client could potentially only read it and not the rest of the proposal. Think of it as the “mini” version of the full-blown report or proposal.
- Define your terms: remember your client does not have a background in I/O psychology.
- Be sure to provide a rationale for each recommendation you make, i.e., justify every decision within your proposal and cite the readings to support all of your recommendations. This is critical for evidence-based practice.
- Be sure to discuss how every recommendation you make is aligned with the client’s organizational strategy. This will ensure you are keeping their strategy in mind with every decision about process that you make. This includes the job analysis methods, appraisal form and format, the delivery of the system including feedback and coaching, the training programs, etc. Don’t just say “this system will be completely aligned with the organizational strategy,” be explicit about how. For example, “This recommendation would provide employees with ongoing support to motivate them to continue to develop and grow their careers at Middle America School supporting the strategy of growth and talent retention.” Using a statement similar to this for all your recommendations is one way to accomplish this objective.
- Note that multiple raters does not mean multisource feedback. They are not the same thing. Multisource feedback (MSF) means you obtain ratings from more than one source, e.g., multiple peer ratings, multiple direct report ratings, boss and self ratings. The assumption is that you have multiple raters within each source. If you are going to propose using MSF, be careful if you are also using the system for administrative purposes. You will need to address why MSF is appropriate for administrative purposes, which is difficult to justify. Multiple raters means more than one rater, i.e., one rating from a boss/supervisor. This can be defined in a few different ways, e.g., more than one supervisor, supervisor and self-rating. Please keep the differences between multiple raters and multisource feedback in mind when addressing the issue of multiple raters in your proposal.
- Times New Roman gives the proposal an academic look and feel; use Verdana, Arial Narrow, or Callibri instead. Single spacing is acceptable for a business proposal.
- Do not use anything from previous courses in this proposal. If there are any matches in the Turnitin report to the proposal you submitted to another course, you will be referred to the Student Affairs Committee for plagiarism. First, you should be treating this as a new assignment. Second, this is a different client and different situation. The same job analysis method you designed for a company in a different industry for a completely different purpose will most likely not be 100% transferable. Be sure to customize the approach for this client and their situation. Different job analysis methods are better for performance appraisal design than for selection system design.
