Guidelines for Self Appraisal Report of Group-A Officers

Government of West Bengal
Finance Department
(Audit Branch)
Nabanna, Howrah – 711 102

No. 2861-F(Y) Dated, Howrah, the 6th of May, 2018

MEMORANDUM

Sub: Introduction of online system of Self Appraisal Report in respect of Group-A Officers of Government of West Bengal

Online system of management of the Self Appraisal Reports in respect of all Group-A Officers of Government of West Bengal has been introduced vide Memo. No. 2748-F(P2) dated 27.04.2018. With this end in view, in supersession of previous relevant guidelines issued in this regard, the Governor is hereby pleased to prescribe the following guidelines relating to submission and grading of Self Appraisal Reports for Group-A Officers of the State Government with effect from 1st June, 2018 in Performance Appraisal Sub-Module of Human Resource Management System (HRMS) of the State Government.

1. The Appraisal Year shall commence from 1st April of a Calendar Year and shall end on 31st March of the next Calendar Year.

2. There shall be a uniform format of SAR for all Group-A Officers of Government of West Bengal from Appraisal Year 2017-18 onwards.

3. The Self Appraisal Report assessing the performance, character, conduct and qualities of every Group-A Officer of the State Government (hereinafter referred to as Officer) for each Appraisal Year or for such period as may be specified by the State Government shall be written as per revised form (online version) given in Schedule-I. While filing up the relevant portions of the form in online mode, the Officers Reported Upon, Reporting Authorities, Reviewing Authorities and Accepting Authorities are required to follow the general instructions provided in Schedule-II.

4. The State Government may, at any time, make such modifications in the form as may be considered necessary.

5. The State Government may allow any Officer or a number of Officers to submit the form in offline mode for any particular period of assessment and in those cases, the State Government may ask the respective Reporting, Reviewing and Accepting Authorities to make their assessment for those Officers also in offline mode.

6. A concept of ‘Custodian’ has been introduced in the process of online SAR who will be the Cadre Controlling Authority itself or any such authority so authorised by the Cadre Controlling Authority. The Custodian of SAR of a particular Cadre(s) will be entrusted with the duty to keep the SAR of the members of the Cadre(s) in his/her custody. The general instructions for Custodians are provided in Schedule-III.

7. For smooth management of the Self Appraisal Reports of the Officers, a concept of ‘Nodal Officer’ has been introduced. The Nodal Officer shall be a Group-A Officer who will create the chain of SAR flow in the System and specify the reporting channel in online mode. There shall be at least one Nodal Officer for each Cadre of a Department. The Nodal Officers may be created in the Department (L1)/ Directorate (L2)/ Regional (L3)/ District (L4)/ Sub-Division (L5)/ Block (L6) level (depending upon the ‘Stakeholder’ created in the System) who will authenticate the SAR flow from employee to Reporting, Reviewing and Accepting Authorities.

For Example: For a Cadre X under the administrative control of Department Y, a single Nodal Officer may be created in the system for all Officers of that Cadre posted in any office OR the Department may create Nodal Officers for Cadre X in all the Districts who shall be entrusted with the duty of creating the hierarchy of Appraisal Authorities of the Officers Reported upon posted in such Districts.

The Nodal Officer shall also be responsible to define in the System whether the flow of SAR will be offline or online. The Nodal Officer may also change the Reporting/Reviewing/Accepting Authority with specific reasons. For the posts for which the comments of Reviewing/Accepting Authorities have been dispensed with, the reporting channel shall be accordingly specified by the Nodal Officer. The general instructions for Nodal Officers are provided in Schedule-IV.

8. The Cadre Controlling Authority controlling one or more Cadre(s) will create the Nodal Officer(s) within the System for the respective Cadre(s) under its control.

9. The Group-A officers posted on deputation will submit their SAR to the Reporting Authority offline in their prescribed formats, if applicable. In the same manner the Reporting Authority will submit the SAR to Reviewing Authority offline and in turn Reviewing Authority will submit it to the Accepting Authority offline. For deputation posts the Custodian will upload the SAR in the System after the same is accepted by the competent authority. At the time of uploading the SAR by the Custodian, the marks awarded to the Officer Reported Upon by different Authorities shall be entered by the Custodian in the System on an equivalent scale from 1 to 10 as in the online SAR System.

10. In case any of the Authorities (Reporting/Reviewing/Accepting) is not present in the online System then he/she can fill their portion of the SAR form offline. In such cases, their immediate preceding Authority in the chain/hierarchy will send the physical copy of the SAR to the Authority not present in the online System. Further, the Authority not present online will send the physical copy of the SAR after making its appraisal in offline mode to the immediate next Authority in the chain/hierarchy, who will upload the same in the System. At the time of uploading the SAR by such Authorities, there would be scope in the System to record the marks awarded to the Officer Reported Upon by their immediately preceding Authorities not present in the online System.

For Example: Suppose the Reporting Officer is a Government Officer having a FIRMS Unique ID No. but the Reviewing Authority is an authority not having a HRMS Unique ID No. (For example: Sabhadhipati of Zilla Parishad, Chairman of Local Bodies, etc.). In this case the Reviewing Authority shall get the physical copy of SAR from the Reporting Authority and fill his/her portion of the SAR in offline mode and forward it to the next Authority (in this case the Accepting Authority) offline. The Accepting Authority in his turn shall scan and upload the Offline SAR in the System, enter attribute-wise marks and overall grading given by the Reviewing Authority in the System and then initiate his portion of appraisal.

11. An employee upon joining in a new post will get a blank SAR form in his/her Inbox after 3 months of continuous service in that post. The employee (Officer Reported Upon) shall submit his/her SAR within one month of release from that post or within 30th April of a Year corresponding to the previous Appraisal Year, whichever is earlier unless otherwise specified by the State Government/Cadre Controlling Authority. In case of delays, the SAR may be locked by the System. Locked SARs can only be unlocked by the concerned Nodal Officer. If an Officer Reported Upon does not initiate SAR in due time, primarily an alert message will be given in his Inbox and the Reporting Authority will be in a position to generate the SAR on behalf of the Officer Reported Upon, if required.

12. Only one Self Appraisal Report shall be written by an Officer for any particular period of the Appraisal Year and there shall be a single Reporting, Reviewing and Accepting Authority at each level of assessment who shall be specified in the reporting chain/hierarchy by the concerned Nodal Officer. Under no circumstances would there be more than one person assessing an SAR in the capacity of either Reporting, Reviewing or Accepting authority for a given period of time.

13. During an Appraisal Year, if the Officer Reported Upon functions in any post for a period of less than 3 months, no Self Appraisal Report will be required to be submitted for that period. In such a case, the Nodal Officer will generate a ‘Not-Required Certificate’ for that period, as per format given in Schedule-V, and send it to the Custodian directly with an intimation to the Officer Reported Upon.

14. If any Officer remains on compulsory waiting, suspension, leave, during a period of report, no Self Appraisal Report will be required for such period. In such case, after decision of appropriate authority, a ‘Not-Required Certificate’ shall be generated by the Nodal Officer for the relevant period.

15. During a particular posting of the Officer Reported Upon, if the post of Reporting Authority is held by more than one person, the Self Appraisal Report may be split up by the Nodal Officer as per tenures of the respective Reporting Authorities.

16. After receiving the approved hierarchy from the Nodal Officer concerned, the Officer Reported Upon shall fill up the portions relevant to him with due care and attention and send it to the Reporting Authority.

17. Information on performance and other issues relating to additional charge(s), if held by the officer reported upon for more than 3 (three) months during the period of report, shall also be mentioned in the Report. This shall be taken into account by the Reporting, Reviewing and Accepting Authorities of the substantive post, while making their assessment.

18. The appraisal, including assessment against the attributes, shall be made by the Reporting Authority with respect to the Self Appraisal made by the Officer Reported Upon. In case of disagreement in respect of the achievements mentioned by the Officer Reported Upon, reasons shall be given.

19. The Reviewing Authority shall record his remarks in the Self Appraisal Report and in case of disagreement with the remarks of the Reporting Authority, he shall specify the reasons and make his own assessment against the attributes.

20. The Accepting Authority shall accept the Self Appraisal Report by making his own assessment appropriately.

21. The Cadre Controlling Authority for the Cadre(s) under its control will decide whether the SAR to be disclosed or not to the Officers Reported Upon.

22. If the Cadre Controlling Authority decides to disclose the SAR to the Officers Reported Upon for the Cadre(s) under its control:

i. The Officer Reported Upon may agree with the assessment made in the Self Appraisal Report or he/she may make a representation for re-assessment to his/her Cadre Controlling Authority mentioning grounds for the same.

ii. On getting such a representation, the Cadre Controlling Authority will examine the same and after considering the merit of the case, may allow for re-assessment by the authority concerned. In that case, the Cadre Controlling Authority will send the Self Appraisal Report to the Authority from whom re-assessment has been sought giving a defined time-frame for such re-assessment. After re-assessment at one level, subsequent steps will again follow and the process will be finally closed by the Cadre Controlling Authority with disclosure to the Officer Reported Upon.

23. In case of considerable delay in appraisal by any Reporting, Reviewing or Accepting Authority or for any other suitable reason, the Nodal Officer may, at any time, take away the Self Appraisal Report from that Authority and allot it to his successor or to his higher authority in the channel to make assessment. However, in such case the Nodal Officer shall give specific reasons for re-allotment of such SAR to any other Reporting, Reviewing or Accepting Authority.

24. In addition to the form of Self Appraisal Report, the Officer Reported Upon shall have to submit appraisal of attendance as introduced vide Memo No. 9135-F dated 10.9.2002 of the Finance Department.

25. The online method of submission and grading of Self Appraisal Reports will come into effect from the Appraisal Year 2017-2018 for all Group-A Officers. However, the online SAR for the Appraisal Year 2017-18 may be submitted w.e.f. 1st June, 2018.

26. For the purpose of SAR, the Nodal Officer, Custodian, Reporting Authority, Reviewing Authority and Accepting Authority need to use Digital Signature Certificate (DSC). In case an Authority does not have a DSC, procurement and use of DSC will be guided by G.O. No. 6138-F(Y) dated 28.11.2016 read with G.O. No. 5209-F(Y) dated 22.08.2017.

Sd/- H.K. Dwivedi
Additional Chief Secretary
to the Government of West Bengal

No. 2861-F dated 06.05.2018, Source