An appraisal is a tool to measure a team member’s strengths and weaknesses and develop an action plan with realistic targets. Generally, appraisals are emphasised as a good motivation technique as they help the workforce feel valued and delegate work to more senior staff Thomas (2003).

Highlighted throughout the case study there appears to be work overload for the deputy manager and sometimes the manager seems to lack vision and dive where decisions need to be made. Therefore, this could lead to confusion within the work force as the manager does not appear to have vision. The employees then have to make their own judgement and carry out the task, this suggests the staff may feel frustrated and unmotivated. Isles-Buck and Newstead (2003:10) suggest that ‘managers need to be able to hold and progress a vision so that the rest of the team are regularly aware of what their work is about and why it is important to change and deliver their practice. Having vision improves the service the setting delivers as well as keeping individual team members focused and motivated’. Goleman (1995) suggests leaders direct where a group is going, yet not how it will get there this indicates employees are free to innovate and take calculated risks. This suggests that in the case study the manager does not always have vision, she does explain where the team needs to aim for, however it may seem she is leaving it up to the staff to know how to get there.

CONCLUSION

The reality has shown that a majority of early years’ professionals use both management and leadership skills. Although commonly assumed as different the terms leadership and management have equally important purposes and possess many traits. Within early years as practitioner’s leadership and management responsibilities are required of practitioners, most of whom manage their own routines their work with children and their families. Almost most of the theories and approaches indicate that motivation is a vital influence for a healthy productive workforce. Which it became apparent that the deputy manager holds more vision than the settings manager, however as the deputy processes many types of leadership and management traits the theories could be seen throughout the case study as she used many different forms of the motivation and management techniques.