SIADAP: a performance management and appraisal system?

Abstract

Performance Management and Appraisal systems have evolved significantly within organisational and social sciences and have become valuable not only for Human Resource Management, but for Organisational Management in general. Drawing on the literature on Performance Management and Appraisal (PMA), this article presents a theoretical analysis of SIADAP (Integrated Performance Appraisal System in Public Administration) with the goal of identifying the features of this new appraisal model of public administration that make it a performance management and appraisal system. This analysis shows that SIADAP is all-encompassing in its appraisal levels, assessing services, managers and employees under the paradigm of Management by Objectives, and that it has the same goals and characteristics of a performance management and appraisal system. However, improving some of its features, such as career management, compensation and training and managers development would bring it closer to a theoretical ideal of a PMA system. Our analysis also points to hierarchy as having a fundamental role in its implementation. This work contributes to a deeper knowledge of the new appraisal model of the Portuguese public administration, describing both its strong points and features which require further development in order to produce the necessary change in this organisational context.