Counselling and managerial appraisal

1. Counselling: meaning and need

Keith Davis: counselling is discussion of an emotional problem with an employee, with the general objective of decreasing it. More broadly, employee counselling is a helping relationship in which a trained person (counsellor, manager or HR specialist) helps an employee understand his problem, consider options and decide what to do, so that his well-being and performance improve.

Why counselling is needed

• Work stress, heavy workloads and targets.
• Conflict with superiors or colleagues.
• Poor performance after appraisal, or failure to get promotion.
• Personal and family problems (health, money, relationships) that affect work.
• Alcohol or drug dependence; absenteeism.
• Change: transfer, restructuring, new technology, layoffs.
• Career confusion, mid-career plateau, approaching retirement.
• Harassment complaints, which also need the formal POSH procedure.

2. Functions of counselling (Keith Davis)

1. Advice — the counsellor suggests a course of action.
2. Reassurance — giving the employee confidence that he can face the problem.
3. Communication — upward (the employee’s feelings reach management) and downward (management’s explanation reaches him).
4. Release of emotional tension — talking to a sympathetic listener relieves frustration (emotional release, or catharsis).
5. Clarified thinking — talking the problem through helps the employee see it rationally.
6. Reorientation — a change in the employee’s goals, values or self-image, often needing a professional counsellor.

3. Types of counselling

Other classifications

• Performance counselling — after appraisal, to analyse performance and plan improvement.
• Career counselling — on career paths and choices.
• Personal (problem) counselling — stress, family, health.
• Pre-retirement and outplacement counselling — for those leaving.
• Employee assistance programmes (EAPs) — confidential professional counselling provided by the employer, often through an outside agency.

4. Process of counselling

1. Establishing rapport — trust, privacy, a non-judgmental attitude.
2. Exploration — the employee describes the problem; the counsellor listens actively and asks open questions.
3. Understanding and diagnosis — identifying the real cause, which may differ from the stated one.
4. Considering options and their consequences.
5. Action planning — agreed steps, with support (training, leave, transfer, medical help).
6. Follow-up — checking progress; referring to specialists if needed.

Qualities of a good counsellor

Empathy, patience, active listening, respect for confidentiality, a non-judgmental attitude, credibility, emotional maturity and knowledge of the organisation’s policies. A manager who counsels his own subordinates must separate the counselling role from the disciplinary role; where the matter is misconduct, the disciplinary procedure, not counselling, applies (see disciplinary action and domestic enquiry).

5. Performance counselling

T.V. Rao treats performance counselling as part of the appraisal system. After the appraisal, the superior meets the employee to:

• review achievements and shortfalls against agreed goals;
• understand the factors that helped or hindered performance;
• identify development needs and plan training;
• set goals for the next period;
• strengthen the superior–subordinate relationship.

Its conditions: a climate of trust, focus on behaviour and not personality, two-way discussion, and an agreed plan at the end.

6. Managerial appraisal

Managerial appraisal is the evaluation of managers as managers. It differs from appraisal of workers because a manager’s output is the work of others, results take time to show, and much of the job (planning, deciding, leading) is not directly measurable.

Approaches (Koontz and Weihrich)

1. Appraisal against verifiable objectives — the MBO approach: did the manager achieve the targets set (sales, cost, quality, staff development)? Objective, but a manager may meet targets by luck or miss them for reasons beyond his control.
2. Appraisal as a manager — against standards of the managerial functions: how well does he plan, organise, staff, lead and control? Koontz suggested a checklist of questions under each function (for example, “Does he set goals for his unit that support the company’s goals?”, “Does he delegate authority to match responsibility?”). The two should be combined: results show what the manager achieved, the functional appraisal shows how.

Other methods used for managers

• Assessment centres for potential and promotion.
• 360-degree feedback for leadership behaviour.
• Balanced scorecard — targets across financial, customer, internal process and learning perspectives.
• Committee appraisal by a panel of senior executives.

Problems in managerial appraisal

• Difficulty of separating the manager’s contribution from the team’s and from external factors.
• Long time lag before decisions show results.
• Qualitative aspects (leadership, judgment) are hard to measure.
• Senior appraisers may be reluctant to judge peers frankly.
• Excessive emphasis on short-term figures.

How this is examined

“Explain counselling in detail” (January 2025, 10 marks); short notes on counselling (January 2026; June 2025) and on managerial appraisal (January 2026; January 2025). For the ten-mark essay: definition, need, Davis’s six functions, the three types, the process, and a paragraph on performance counselling. For the managerial appraisal note: why it differs, the two Koontz approaches, and three problems.