Performance appraisal at the water development department of Cyprus

Abstract

Performance appraisal of public servants is a very old practice intended to establish the skills and competencies of employees. In recent decades, however, the reduction of funds allocated for Public Administration and the aim for greater efficiency and effectiveness increased the concern over the possible use of available resources. The purpose of this study is to explore the acceptance of the existing evaluation system in the Water Development Department (WDD) of the Cypriot government. The study includes a survey on employers of WDD in answering the following questions: i. Do they agree with the phenomenon of excessive flattering of civil servants with the assessment of "excellent"? ii. Do they accept the evaluating system? iii. Why a rating system is necessary? iv. What is the existing evaluation system? v. What or who is the reason for the phenomenon of complete flattering? vi. What is the quality of the existing evaluation system? The results of this research were used to identify the parameters of the existing system and draw conclusions for the evaluation system currently used at the WDD. Moreover, this study refers to concerns about the role of top manager and problems arising from the need to balance between legitimacy and effective evaluation in the context of meritocracy, transparency and predictability.