NCJ Number
207822
Journal
Law and Order Volume: 52 Issue: 9 Dated: September 2004 Pages: 100,102,103
Date Published
September 2004
Length
3 pages
Annotation
This article assesses current police department performance evaluations as virtually useless in influencing how a department and its personnel perform their tasks; a procedure for developing effective performance evaluations is proposed.
Abstract
Generic police evaluation forms typically have little relevance to how and with what proficiency an employee is contributing to the department's mission, as well as how that contribution might be improved or modified to be more effective. Performance evaluations must relate directly to the department's mission, strategic plan, and tactics. The department's mission is what it wishes to accomplish in global terms. The strategic plan is the plan of action for achieving the mission, including resource allocation. Tactics are the actions done daily to achieve the mission. Because these components of departmental and employee performance must be regularly monitored to ensure that goals and objectives are being achieved, monthly performance meetings that feature direct reports of strategy and tactics, as well as how they relate to the departmental mission, are more useful than traditional once-a-year perfunctory evaluation rituals. These meetings should focus on specific goals related to the department's mission, the strategies that have been devised to meet those goals, the tactical implementation of the strategies, and the outcomes. Each employee is thus assessed in terms of specific actions within his/her job description that are related to the department's mission and how those actions might be improved or changed to increase the employee's contribution to the mission.