 | Performance Evaluation in the Human Services Subjects: Health and Social Care; Development Studies Environment Social Work Urban Studies; Social Work; Social Work and Social Policy; Administration and Management; Performance Evaluation in the Human Services is a practical, specific book for managers on how to conduct performance evaluations. The book moves beyond the traditional rating scale and focuses on a new model involving the employee in the evaluation process. It stresses the need for evaluation scales to match the job description in a manner that is educational, future-oriented, and time-saving. Managers who must conduct performance reviews will find that this book presents a unique advancement on the use of behaviorally anchored rating scales for evaluation. The authors focus on the developmental/educational components of evaluation and stress employee empowerment as a result of evaluation. The authors have created an employee review system with three core components. The new appraisal model works on a "One Size Fits All" philosophy. It can be applied to all employees while the exact evaluating qualities differ as each job description does. Fundamental features of this new evaluative model include: the use of the "Benchmark" concept, a scale which indicates the level of the organization's expectations and balances the administrative (evaluative) components and professional (developmental) issues BARS, Behaviorally Anchored Rating Scales CORE and A LA CARTE Dimensions which allows for evaluation of generic aspects of performance and job specific components the use of traditional approaches to evaluation such as trait-based scales and forced comparison techniques The rating system in Performance Evaluation in the Human Services serves as a means of identifying areas for middle and upper managers to identify areas for employees'professional growth and self-development. This approach is goal-oriented and can change and grow with the employee and the organization. Most importantly, it is built by both staff and management to be used as a tool for working together to define specific job requirements and how these requirements can be met and evaluated. Author Kenneth Millar was born in Los Gatos, California, on December 13, 1915. A difficult and peripatetic childhood, coupled with dual American and Canadian citizenship, caused Millar to feel for many years as if the world were an unstable place; certainly, he was unsure of his own place in it. A one-time high school English and history teacher, the successful writing career of his wife Margaret Millar allowed him to leave teaching and enter graduate school at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. There he wrote his first novel, "The Dark Tunnel" (1944). His own psychotherapy helped relieve him of his childhood neuroses, and what he called his "breakthrough novel," "The Galton Case" (1959), is written with a new, strong, and confident voice. Along with Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler, Millar is considered one of America's finest writers of detective fiction. His primary protagonist, Lew Archer, often becomes involved in the psychological dimensions of his cases. He wrote the Lew Archer books under the name Ross MacDonald. The plots of his novels are complex, and he focuses on southern California as a beautiful land where people's actions corrupt the naturally peaceful setting. Critic John Vermillion has noted that "Over a span of more than thirty years, Millar has created a large body of fiction informed by acute observation, significant ideas, integrity, wisdom, and craftsmanship. Within and above these qualities he has found the elusive tension, emotional and imaginative, which molds the novel into an active experience. But equally important is that he has written popular fiction which may be read by a cross section of the reading public." He died on July 11, 1983 (Bowker Author Biography) |
