Introduction

Why do we analyze organizational culture and climate? How do our analyses help us make organizations better? Where do these topics fit among the major issues facing not only organizational studies but social science as a whole as well as contemporary society? The contributors of this volume answer different parts of these basic questions and answer them in different ways. In the introduction, we offer a guide to how the different parts of these questions fit together and where the different ways of answering them fit within organizational science and social science

High Job Performance Through Co-Developing Performance Measures With Employees

This is the version of the paper as originally submitted for publication in Human Resource Management. The paper accepted for publication has the same title (DOI: 10.1002/hrm.21762). BIANCA GROEN recently obtained her PhD degree in Organizational Behavior and Management Accounting from the University of Twente. Before that, she got a bachelor's and master's MARC WOUTERS holds a chair in Management Accounting at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology and the University of Amsterdam Business School. Before, he was full professor at the University of Twente (2001Twente ( -2011, and worked at Eindhoven University of Technology (1996)(1997)(1998)(1999)(2000)(2001), Ernst & Young Management Consultants (1993 CO-DEVELOPING PERFORMANCE MEASURES AND JOB PERFORMANCE 1 HIGH JOB PERFORMANCE THROUGH CO-DEVELOPING PERFORMANCE MEASURES WITH EMPLOYEES According to various studies, employee participation in the development of performance measures is supposed to increase job performance. For this purpose, it is important to know how this job performance elevation occurs. This is the focus of the present study. Based on the theory of planned behavior, we hypothesize that job performance is dependent upon employees' attitudes towards, perceived social norms for, and perceived control over performing well in their job. We hypothesize that when employees have co-developed performance measures, they perceive these performance measures to be of higher quality, which in turn elevates employees' attitudes towards, perceived social norms for, and perceived control over performing well in their job. Survey data from 95 employees and 88 of their managers were analyzed using structural equation modeling. Employee participation in developing performance measures is found to be related to job performance via perceived measurement quality and employees' perceived control over performing well. We discuss the practical and theoretical implications of these findings, including the limitations of the study's design, and sketch future research in this area. Keywords: theory of planned behavior; job performance; employee participation in the development of performance measures; quality of performance measures; perceived control Introduction Employee participation is an important topic in human resource management (HRM) research (e.g., Despite the large amount of studies about employee participation, few of them investigate how these beneficial participation-performance effects are achieved. To explain how HRM practices-such as employee participation-affect job performance and eventually organizational performance, researchers increasingly focus on employees' perceptions of these practices (e.g., Alfes, Truss, Soane, Irrespective of the intentions of the HRM department or the line managers who implement HRM practices, these practices affect employee behavior and performance only if employees perceive HRM practices to be existent When investigating how employee participation can lead to positive effects, one should be specific about the type of participation studied The current study examines employee participation in the development of performance measures. Performance measures quantitatively express job performance, including both individual and group measures. Such measures include client satisfaction, efficiency, and the amount of work completed in a certain amount of time. We define employee participation in developing performance measures as the extent of influence employees feel they have had on the design, implementation and maintenance of the performance measures they are measured by. This influence includes participation in goal or target setting, as well as the co-development of other features of performance measures such as name, purpose, calculation formula, frequency of CO-DEVELOPING PERFORMANCE MEASURES AND JOB PERFORMANCE 3 measuring, data sources, and responsibilities Prior studies found positive effects of employee participation in the development of performance measures on the performance of employees and work units The main goal of this study is to examine how employee participation in developing performance measures and job performance are linked through cognitive, motivational and social factors, as well as through perceived measurement quality. We define job performance as the extent to which employees meet their job requirements according to their manager First, we introduce perceived measurement quality as a promising construct for explaining the link between employee participation in developing performance measures and job performance. Perceived measurement quality is defined as the extent to which employees find the performance measures sensitive to their actions, precise in measuring relevant aspects of their performance, and verifiable Second, the theory of planned behavior (Ajzen, 1991)-which encompasses the three earlier introduced cognitive, motivational and social factors-is used to explain how better perceived measurement quality can increase job performance. To our knowledge, the theory of planned behavior has not yet been used to explain job performance, even though Fishbein and Ajzen (2010, p. 3) suggest this theory to be extremely relevant in this regard. The theory of planned behavior distinguishes three antecedents of any particular kind of behavior. The first, attitude, is a motivational construct defined as an individual's view on a behavior. The second construct, perceived social norms, is a social construct and comprises the extent to which CO-DEVELOPING PERFORMANCE MEASURES AND JOB PERFORMANCE 5 employees believe significant others expect them to behave in a certain way. The third construct, perceived behavioral control, is cognitive in nature and refers to the extent to which one sees oneself capable of performing the behavior. This study uses a sample of employee-manager dyads from various jobs, organizations and industries to examine the link between employee participation in developing performance measures and job performance. The next section explains the theoretical model linking these two constructs. Subsequently, the survey method is further explained, after which the structural equation modeling results are given. The paper closes with a discussion of its theoretical and practical implications, limitations and suggestions for future research. Hypotheses Figure 1 depicts the hypothetical model and the definitions of the constructs. First, we hypothesize if employees have an influence on the design of performance measures, they will consider them to be of better quality than if they had no influence. Next, perceived measurement quality is hypothesized to be related to employees' attitudes towards, perceived norms for, and perceived control over performing well in their job. These three constructs, in turn, are hypothesized to be positively related to high job performance. Below we will elaborate on the theory and theorizing from which we derived these hypotheses. Some employees may try to use the opportunity for participation to "game" the system, that is, "take actions that increase pay-outs […] without improving actual performance" (Baker, 1992, p. 600). Yet, according to social exchange theory, few employees are likely to do so, because once given the opportunity to participate they are likely to feel they are being treated fairly, which makes them want to treat their employer fairly in return Hypothesis 1: Employee participation in developing performance measures is positively related to perceived measurement quality. Perceived measurement quality and attitude towards performing well Attitude towards performing well is defined here as the employee's evaluation regarding always meeting all job requirements (see Perceived norms for performing well In this study's context, perceived norms for performing well is defined as the extent to which employees perceive significant others as expecting them to always meet all the job requirements and the extent to which these others themselves always try to meet all job High-quality performance measures may increase injunctive norms because they clarify the requirements of someone's work role If the quality of performance measures is better, not only injunctive, but also descriptive norms are enriched. As people generally fear the negative consequence of being different Empirical research on the relationship between perceived measurement quality and perceived norms for performing well is scarce. In the reasoning behind Hypothesis 2 we explained how perceived measurement quality influences autonomous motivation. Research has shown, autonomous motivation also influences perceived norms for performing well Hypothesis 3: Perceived measurement quality is positively related to perceived norms for performing well. Perceived control over performing well Perceived control over performing well is defined as the extent to which employees believe to be capable of always meeting all job requirements (cf. Perceived measurement quality is hypothesized to affect perceived control over performing well for several reasons. High-quality performance measures communicate to employees how one is to excel in one's work Hypothesis 4: Perceived measurement quality is positively related to perceived control over performing well. Job performance According to the theory of planned behavior, the extent to which people perform any kind of behavior can be explained by their attitude, perceived norms and/or perceived control to perform the behavior. Empirical support for the applicability of the theory of planned behavior to a broad range of behavior has been documented in numerous studies and meta-analyses CO-DEVELOPING PERFORMANCE MEASURES AND JOB PERFORMANCE 11 According to Fishbein and Ajzen (2010, p. 17), attitude towards performing well is a form of job satisfaction. The relationship between job satisfaction and job performance has often been studied and meta-analyses find a significant effect between the two (Judge, Moreover, motivation-enhancing HRM practices are found to have positive meta-analytical effects on many types of performance outcomes Hypothesis 5: Attitude towards performing well is positively related to job performance. Although most theories and research in HRM and organizational behavior regard motivational and cognitive factors as the prime sources of positive performance effects of participation (e.g.