Self Assessment Tools (SAT) as One of the Basic Tools for Performance Management: A Critique

Abstract

The alignment of employees to the organizational goal, vision and mission is very imperative and cannot be emphasize enough. As such, there is need for organizations to deliberately bring their workforce on board to achieve this set goals or targets. It is also important for employees to assess themselves from time to time to ascertain that they are up-to- date with the vision, goal and mission of the organization, this literally translate into self-assessment- a process of keeping self in proper check to ascertain correctness and alignment with organizational objective. The central theme of this article is to examine the role of Self-Assessment Tool (SAT) in performance management, the article also examine the shortfall of this tool developed by Bureau for Public Service Reform (BPSR). The method adopted for this study is survey method using questionnaires, one hundred questionnaires were administered among forty (40) junior, thirty (30) senior staff in the Office of the Secretary to the State Government (SSG), Enugu State, twenty (20) contract staff and ten (10) permanent staff of First Bank Plc, presidential road, Enugu. The results from the analysis shows that, the results from Self-Assessment Tool (SAT) are not made public and it gives preferences to government agencies at the detriment of private sector. The paper further X-ray the importance of performance management, ranging from reduced costs in the organization, aligns the organization directly between its employees and the strategic goals and stop project overruns. The paper concludes by noting that the result of the assessment may be made public, to guide policy making process and finally, the private sector should also be incorporated into the tool.