Evaluating the effectiveness of performance management system (PMS) on teachers’ performance in Junior Secondary Schools of Botswana: a case study of Kweneng region

Abstract

The effective management of public sector is an area of concern for most governments. Many countries have endeavoured to improve the effectiveness of their public sectors so as to meet the international standards. Consequently, most governments therefore, implemented performance improvement reforms, such as performance management system commonly known as PMS. Despite the introduction of PMS that was to promote productivity or effectiveness in the public sector there has not been adequate attention on its impact, particularly in public schools, both in post developed countries and developing countries. The aim of this study therefore was to evaluate the effectiveness of PMS in selected junior secondary schools, focusing on the Kweneng region, in Botswana as well as identify the challenges associated with PMS implementation. To achieve these objectives, the research adopted a mixed methods approach, triangulating qualitative and quantitative methodologies. Three case studies of three junior secondary schools were employed to allow for detailed analysis of the matter. The study used convenience selection criteria to select the three schools from Kweneng region and purposively selected thirty teachers and four regional education officials as respondents to the open-ended questionnaire and interview respectively. The findings of this study have revealed that PMS has not made an impact on teacher’s performance and schools’ effectiveness due to the following reasons; lack of understanding of PMS by the teachers and their supervisors, PMS being irrelevant to teaching, inconsistency of the system, non-implementation of performance based reward system (PBRS), scarce resources, inadequate support and supervision by the region and school management teams as well as negative attitudes by some teachers and supervisors towards PMS. However, some recommendations have been suggested to try and make PMS more meaningful to schools and these are; customization of PMS to school context so that a relationship could be achieved, provision of guidelines to help schools, implementation of PBRS, formation of technical teams at sub/regional level and schools as well as deployment of reform officers at sub-regional level, relieving senior teacher staff development from their teaching responsibilities.