Proceedings oI International ConIerence on Computing Sciences

WILKES100 ICCS 2013

ISBN: 978-93-5107-172-3
Fuzzy rule based expert system Ior employee appraisal based on
UGC guidelines
Nidhi Gumber
1*
, Prateek Aggarwal
1
, Sanjay Kumar Singh
1
and Leena Jain
2

1
Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Lovely Professional University, PB, India
2
Department of Computer Applications, Global Institute of Management and Emerging Technologies, Amritsar, PB, India
Abstract
Employee Appraisal system is an important strategy oI any organization to manage the human resources. A lot oI Iactors are
important Ior an employee to evaluate and improve their perIormance. Employee`s promotions, salary bonus and many other
incentives are based only on their perIormance in organization. In this paper, a Iuzzy-logic approach is implemented to
calculate the employee`s perIormance at higher university level considering the Iactors deIined by UGC guidelines that have
major eIIect on an employee`s perIormance. A Iuzzy rule-base is implemented using the critical Iactors. And then all the
deIuzziIication techniques are applied on the data oI employees to rank those employees.
2013 Elsevier Science. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Fuzzy Expert System, API Scores, Fuzzy InIerence System, FuzziIication, DeIuzziIication
1. Introduction
PerIormance appraisal is a Iormal management system that provides Ior the evaluation oI the quality oI an
individual`s perIormance in an organization. PerIormance appraisal is the procedure to evaluate the current and
past perIormance oI an employee. (Moon, 2007) There are various techniques and Iactors used to evaluate the
perIormance oI en employee. As outlined by GMeenakshi, various Iactors include Planning and Preparation oI
course (eIIectiveness and punctuality), Maintaining classroom discipline and control on class, Communication
and knowledge skills and ProIessional responsibilities and contributions towards college and society. On other
hand, Abdur Rashid Khan includes some more Iactors like Research contribution to the evaluate employee
appraisal.
Fuzzy set theory is very common Ior developing an expert system. Chiang and Lin have proposed a method
Ior teaching assessment using Iuzzy system (T.T.Chiang, 1994). Chen and Lee have proposed two diIIerent
methods to evaluate the students using Iuzzy sets (S.M.Chen, 1999). Similarly there exist so many expert systems
which use Iuzzy set theory.
Various techniques are present Ior evaluating employees like Rating, Trait scales, criteria based, management
by objectives (MBO), 360 degree Ieedback, work planning and review and peer review. (C. C. Yee, 2010) All
techniques have their own advantages and disadvantages, most organizations use all oI these techniques together
to work eIIectively.
2. Design of Fuzzy Expert System
Design oI Iuzzy expert system is shown in Iig 1.1. This Iigure describes the process, how to sequentially create
this Iuzzy expert system. These steps are discusses one by one below.
*
Corresponding author - Nidhi Gumber
80 Elsevier Publications, 2013
Nidhi Gumber, Prateek Aggarwal, Sanfav Kumar Singh and Leena Jain

2.1. Identification Of Factors
This step is the initial step in our work where we need to identiIy the Iactors that will directly have an impact
on the employee`s perIormance. These Iactors are mainly divided in three major categories, which we will
discuss here:
2.1.1 Teaching, Learning and Evaluation related activities: This major Iactor is mainly considering the
teaching related activities which are essential Ior a Iaculty member to perIorm. This major Iactor consists oI the
Iollowing points: -
2.1.1.1 Essential: This category consists oI Iactors like Lectures taken as percentage oI lectures allocated,
Tutorials hours undertaken as percentage oI actual allocated, Practical or Lab hours taken as percentage oI actual
allocated, Imparting oI knowledge/ instruction with prescribed material, College/University examination duties
(question paper setting, vetting, and evaluation), CA evaluation duties, Additional examination duties like Ilying
squad, invigilation etc.
2.1.1.2 Desirable: Desirable is another sub-category oI Iirst major category. This category consists oI some
points which depend on the desire oI a Iaculty member, whether he/she wants to perIorm these tasks or not. This
includes Iactors like Instruction Plan designing, Scheme creation, Syllabus catalogue designing, Course catalogue
designing, Conduction oI any training or workshop etc.
2.1.2 Co-Curricular, Extension and Profession-related activities: This is another major category which
involves the contribution oI a Iaculty member in co-curricular activities like sports, cultural committees, training
and placement committee etc. This category again contains subcategories, which are described below:
2.1.2.1 Co-Curricular and Extension activities: This category involves Iactors like Contribution to Corporate
liIe (Research coordinator, Academic Operation Coordinator, Master course coordinator and course coordinator),
Institutional Co-Curricular activities Ior students (Placement / Training coordinator), Community Service and
other student mentoring activities through NSS/NCC/NSO, Students and staII-related socio cultural and sports
programs (Sports/Cultural committees), ProIessional ethics and campus development activities etc.
2.1.2.2 Profession-related contribution: This category consists oI the points that are concerned with the
contribution given to the activities related with their proIession like Institutional Governance responsibilities,
Membership in proIession related committees at state and national level, Participation in conIerences, seminars,
Participation in Faculty Development Program, ProIessional Learning Committee, short term training courses
less than one week, Membership oI proIessional associations committees, Boards oI Studies etc.
2.1.3 Research Publications: This is third major category, which is concerned Ior their contribution in
research area. It involves research publications, text books written, journals published etc. It consists oI Iollowing
sub-categories: -
2.1.3.1 Research Papers published: This category considers the papers published in journals with a good
impact Iactor. This category includes Iactors like ReIereed journals with impact Iactor listed in Thomson Reuters,
ReIereed journals not listed in Thomson Reuters but recognized journal, ConIerence proceedings as Iull paper in
recognized conIerence etc.
2.1.3.2 Conference/ Seminars/ Workshop Papers: This category includes the conIerences, seminars or
workshops that a Iaculty member has attended and presented any paper. The main Iactors included in this
category are Papers in ConIerence/ Seminar/ Workshops (International ConIerence, National ConIerence),
Invited Lectures or presentations (International level, National level) etc.
2.1.3.3 Student Mentorship for research guidance: This category will include the number oI students one
Iaculty member has Ior research guidance. We consider the Iactors like Number oI M.Tech students Ior research
guidance, Number oI M.Phil students Ior research guidance, Number oI PhD students Ior research guidance,
Number oI Capstone project groups oI under-graduates Ior guidance etc.
2.1.3.4 Research Publications (Books, Chapters in Book, other than refereed journal): This category includes
Iactors like Books published by International publisher, Books published by National level or State level
publisher, Chapters contributed to the volumes published by International publisher, Chapters contributed to the
volumes published by National publisher etc.
2.1.3.5 Research Projects: This category considers the projects that a Iaculty member is doing or has
completed. The Iactors considered in this category are Sponsored Projects with budget( 50 lakh or above, 30 to
81 Elsevier Publications, 2013
Fuzzy rule based expert system for employee appraisal based on UGC guidelines

50 lakh, 10 to 30 lakh, 5 to 10 lakh), Completed Projects with budget( Above 30 lakh, Below 30 lakh,
International) etc.
2.2. Fuzzification
FuzziIication is a process oI converting crisp values oI an input to Iuzzy values. We do this by simply
recognizing that many oI the quantities that we consider to be crisp and deterministic are actually not
deterministic at all, they carry considerable uncertainty. (Ross, 2005)
Table 1
Critical
Factors
Fuzzy linguistic input variables with
membership range
Fuzzy linguistic output
variables with
membership range
Essential
Iactors
Poor Avera
ge
Good PerIormance in terms oI
Essential Factors (0-100)
poor Below avg avg
Above
avg
Good
Lectures,
Labs,
Tutorials
(0-50)
0-20 10-30 20-50
0-25 20-35 30-45 40-60 55-75
Imparting
oI
knowledge
(0-20)
0-8 5-15 12-20
Examinatio
n Duties (0-
10)
0-3 1-7 5-10
CA
evaluation(
0-10)
0-3 1-7 5-10
Additional
duties(0-10)
0-3 1-7 5-10
Desirabl
e Iactors
Poor Avera
ge
Good PerIormance in terms oI
Desirable Factors (0-50)
poor Below avg avg Above
avg
good
IP
designing
(0-10)
0-5 2-8 5-10
0-12.5 10-18 15-23 20-30 27-37
Scheme
Creation
(0-10)
0-5 2-8 5-10
Course
Catalogue
Design (0-
10)
0-5 2-8 5-10
Syllabus
Catalogue
design(0-
10)
0-5 2-8 5-10
Conductio
n oI any
training
(0-10)
0-5 2-8 5-10
82 Elsevier Publications, 2013

The conversion can be done using membership Iunctions. Following are the tables prepared with expert views
Ior the membership Iunction ranges and overlapping region.
Table 1.1 is describing the subcategories oI Iirst main category oI Teaching, Learning and Evaluation related
activities. It contains the linguistic variables as Low, Average and SatisIactory. The various ranges described
here, are the regions deIined Ior these linguistic variables. Tables Ior all other categories are also prepared in the
same way. Following Iigures are showing the Fuzzy InterIace in Fuzzy toolbox in MATLAB: -
Fig 1.2 shows the sample IuzziIication Ior Essential Iactors, with ranges as deIined above. This sample contains
Iive input values, each deIined with three membership Iunctions, describing Low, Average, and SatisIactory.
Fig1.2: - Fuzzy Ior Essential Iactors
Fig 1.3 shows the sample IuzziIication oI Desirable Iactors in Fuzzy Toolbox oI MATLAB.
1.3 Fuzzy Rule Formation
Fuzzy rule base is prepared with IF-THEN rules, aIter Ietching knowledge Irom domain experts. These rules
decide the output oI a crisp value given as input to Iuzzy. The input to an iI-then rule is the current value Ior the
input variable and the output is an entire Iuzzy set. (Rohan) Here, as we are Iollowing a nested Iuzzy approach,
we have designed diIIerent Iuzzy systems Ior diIIerent categories as well as sub-categories, and these Iuzzy
systems have diIIerent number oI rules designed. Rules Ior Iuzzy inIerences are as shown in Iollowing Iigures.
83 Elsevier Publications, 2013
Nidhi Gumber, Prateek Aggarwal, Sanfav Kumar Singh and Leena Jain
Fuzzy rule based expert system for employee appraisal based on UGC guidelines

Rule Base designed Ior Essential Category contains 243 rules, which are in IF-THEN Iorm. Sample oI these
rules are as shown: -
II (LecturesSeminarsTutorials is low) and (ImpartingoIknowledge is low) and (Examinationduties is
low) and (CAandMteevaluation is low) and (InvigilationFlyingSquadduties is low) then
(EssentialPerIormance is low).
In similar way, all other Iuzzy systems are designed. Fig 1.4 shows the rule base designed Ior all categories
including 1. FirstCat (Teaching, learning and evaluation related activities) 2. SecondCat (Co-Curricular and
proIession-related activities) 3. ThirdCat (Research and academic contribution). This Iuzzy will calculate the
Iinal scores which a Iaculty member will achieve considering all the Iactors. In this Iuzzy, there are three inputs
and one output, with 27 rules designed. Some sample rules designed in Iorm oI IF-THEN are shown below: -
II (FirstCat is poor) and (SecondCat is average) and (ThirdCat is poor) then (Iinalscores is belowavg).
II (FirstCat is poor) and (SecondCat is average) and (ThirdCat is good) then (Iinalscores is average).
II (FirstCat is average) and (SecondCat is belowavg) and (ThirdCat is belowavg) then (Iinalscores is
average).
II (FirstCat is aboveavg) and (SecondCat is good) and (ThirdCat is good) then (Iinalscores is good).
II (FirstCat is excellent) and (SecondCat is good) and (ThirdCat is average) then (Iinalscores is good).
Fig 1.4: - Rule base Ior all categories
2.3. Inference System Design
Mamdani system is used in our system to design the inIerence, as it is most popular inIerence system to be
used. In Mamdani inIerence system, Max-Min composition is used. Mamdani system Iollows 4 steps to calculate
the Max-Min composition oI each rule. The steps are: -
Evaluate the antecedent Ior each rule.
Obtain each rule`s conclusion.
Aggregate conclusions oI all rules.
DeIuzziIication.
Given the inputs as crisp values, it gets the membership values. II the rule have two antecedent parts and both
are connected by OR operator (disjunction), then it will calculate the result oI rule by applying OR operation
(max value). And iI both antecedent parts oI rule are connected by AND (conjunction) operator, then it will
calculate the result oI rule by applying AND operation (min value).
Now when we get the antecedent value oI rules Irom step 1 and as we have consequent part oI the rule, it
applies Iuzzy implication method on it, which will truncate the membership value oI the consequent.
84 Elsevier Publications, 2013

AIter getting truncated values oI each rule, it aggregates the values oI each rule to get a single Iuzzy set. And
then by applying deIuzziIication, it gets a single value representing the whole set.
(Alonso, 2013)
The overall inIerence system design is as shown in Iigure 1.5 below: -
Fig 1.5: - InIerence system design
1.5 Defuzzification
In simple words, we can say deIuzziIication is to Translate results back to the real world values.
DeIuzziIication is the reverse process oI IuzziIication. The task oI DeIuzziIication is to Iind one single crisp value
that summarizes the Iuzzy set that enters it Irom the inIerence block. (Lyons, 2012) The most popular
deIuzziIication method is the centroid calculation, which returns the center oI area under the curve. There are Iive
built-in methods supported: centroid, bisector, middle oI maximum (the average oI the maximum value oI the
output set), largest oI maximum, and smallest oI maximum. We have applied all the methods on input sets and
compare their ranks.
1.6 Evaluating and Testing the Results
For evaluating and testing the results, we are using the employee`s data oI Lovely ProIessional University,
Phagwara. The inIerence engine used here is Mamdani Iuzzy system. Results oI these employees are as shown in
table 1.2.
85 Elsevier Publications, 2013
Nidhi Gumber, Prateek Aggarwal, Sanfav Kumar Singh and Leena Jain
Fuzzy rule based expert system for employee appraisal based on UGC guidelines

Table 1.2: - Results aIter evaluation
F
a
c
u
l
t
y

I
D
F
i
r
s
t

C
a
t
e
g
o
r
y

(
0
-
7
5
)
S
e
c
o
n
d


C
a
t
e
g
o
r
y

(
0
-
3
0
)
T
h
i
r
d

C
a
t
e
g
o
r
y

(
0
-
4
5
)

DeIuzziIied Output and ranks
Centroid ranks Bisector ranks MOM ranks LOM ranks SOM ranks
F1 48.33 8.1435 13.2025 42.7 3 42.8 3 42.8 4 42.8 4 42.8 4
F2 45.789 3.5604 13.2025 42.7 3 42.8 3 42.8 4 44.3 4 41.3 5
F3 48.33 3.5544 13.2025 42.7 3 42.8 3 42.8 4 42.8 4 42.8 4
F4 37.498 3.5604 13.2025 42.7 3 42.8 3 42.8 4 42.8 4 42.8 4
F5 29.66 3.5575 13.2025 32.7 4 32.2 4 33 5 33.7 5 32.2 7
F6 28.656 3.5575 13.2025 32.7 4 32.2 4 32.2 6 32.2 6 32.2 7
F7 37.4 3.5604 31.7354 52.7 2 53.4 2 52.6 3 53.4 2 51.9 3
F8 42.981 3.5574 13.2025 42.7 3 42.8 3 42.8 4 45.8 3 38.3 6
F9 37.49 11.216 13.2025 42.7 3 42.8 3 42.8 4 42.8 4 42.8 4
F10 63.53 3.5604 13.2007 52.7 2 53.4 2 53.4 2 53.4 2 53.4 2
F11 48.33 11.218 31.7224 67.4 1 67 1 67 1 68.5 1 65.4 1
F12 48.33 11.218 22.4364 52.7 2 53.4 2 53.4 2 53.4 2 53.4 2
3. Conclusion
This paper proposes a method Ior evaluating the perIormance oI employees based on various Iactors as
considered by UGC. This system is implemented on higher university level. It can also be implemented in any
university recognized by UGC. The output oI system is entirely dependent on the API scores that a Iaculty
obtained Irom his activities, more the contribution he will make more scores he will get. In Iuture, this system can
be extended to the neuro-Iuzzy approach, which will help it to improve its results more.
References
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|10| Moore, J.S.(1990). An Expert System Prototype Ior PerIormance Appraisal oI Managerial Communication. Indiana University at Fort
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87 Elsevier Publications, 2013
Nidhi Gumber, Prateek Aggarwal, Sanfav Kumar Singh and Leena Jain
Index

A
API scores, 86

D
Defuzzification, 85

F
FES. see Fuzzy expert system (FES)
Fuzzification process, 8283
Fuzzy expert system (FES), 80
defuzzification, 85
evaluating and testing, 8586
factors, identification of, 8182
for essential factors, 83
fuzzification process, 8283
inference system design, 8485
rule formation, 8384
toolbox of MATLAB, 83
Fuzzy rule formation, 8384

I
Inference system design, 8485

T
Toolbox of MATLAB, 83