Impact of Goal Settings on Performance |
A report studying the effectiveness of goal setting mechanism in the IT industry |
Submitted to Prof.Abhishek Totawar, by Group 3,PGP 13-15 |
12/15/2013
Introduction: Every company has targets and so do its employees. Today, every company sets goals for each of its employees at the beginning of each year and evaluates performance at a latter point to keep track of employee development and to align his/her work to the broad goals of the company. These goals are the basic parameters of evaluation and hence determine the performance pay of the employees too. But how efficient is this system? How satisfied are the employees, managers and HRs themselves about this system? These were the questions which motivated us to take up this project work, wherein we made sincere attempts to understand the viability and vulnerabilities of the goal setting mechanism. In a nut shell, we have tried to analysis the overall impact of goal setting process on the performance of an individual in an organisation.
Methodology: Adapting the ways of market research, our methodology included conducting primary research, holding surveys and Focus groups of both employees and managers. Later we obtained the opinions of HR professional from reputed industries about the entire system to validate our results
Major Findings: From the focus group that was conducted among five participants who had experiencing ranging from 3-5 years in the IT industry, we found out that there was a goal setting mechanism in almost all companies. Although different companies had different methods of setting goals for employees, almost all of the respondents agreed that relative performance was valued more than the set goals being achieved. Another revelation was that the employees should be given an opportunity to reject the goals being put forth by the manager, and some of the respondents exercised their option to do this.
Among 128 participants surveyed, 71%...