evelopment schemes. Employees meet with their managers once every four months to discuss the employees’ performance to-date. The interview process is characterized by the supportive and encouraging roles every manager adopts towards their subordinates. Unlike many other appraisal interviews, managers do not only focus and highlight employee weaknesses. When certain deficiencies in performance are discussed, managers recognize that negative feedback is uncomfortable to both parties and can also be counter-productive. Thus, they usually identify areas for improvement to employees in a very supportive approach. The objective is to rectify the deficiency by motivating the employee to change, rather than imposing additional stress on him / her by merely pointing the weakness(s) out.3.1.3 Job Training ProgramsJob training programs provide employees with a broader knowledge and skills enabling them to better handle the expectations from their roles. Employee stress is often caused by the lack of skills or knowledge to meet designated objectives and goals. These programs usually take on two forms - knowledge-based development and skills-based development. Knowledge-based development programs usually involve a conference or seminar where the aim is to broaden the attendees’ knowledge of a certain topic such as infomatics seminar briefing employees on the latest networking technologies. The knowledge gained from such programs may or may not be utilized in the everyday job routines of employees. Alternatively, skill-based development programs focus on training employees to become more proficient in the use of certain behaviours such as assertiveness training. While job training programs can reduce work stress, there are essentially three conditions to its success . First, the job training must be required by the employee. No benefit would be derived if an employee is trained for something that is not relevant to the work he / she perfo...
