Evaluations Called for To Monitor and Assess Executive Appraisal Systems

GAO reviewed the Senior Executive Service (SES) performance appraisal system. The appraisal process is intended to evaluate the performance of senior executives and provide a basis for making many executive personnel decisions, including monetary performance awards, development, advancement, and dismissals. GAO stated that, while it is too early to judge the overall effectiveness of the SES appraisal systems, it wanted to identify existing or potential problems so that agencies and the Office of Personnel Management can take corrective action.

GAO stated that non-Federal experience shows that pretesting, user training, evaluation of systems, and several years of development are important steps to implementing successful performance appraisal systems. Since many agencies did not follow these steps in implementing their SES systems, the first few years in operation will be experimental. As a result, agencies need to develop and implement formal evaluation systems to monitor and assess the effectiveness of their SES performance appraisal processes to insure that they are valid, fair, and objective. GAO concluded that, unless a reliable and timely method exists for evaluating and monitoring appraisal systems, areas which need improvement cannot be effectively identified.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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