Page 252 - Psychological Management of Individual Performance

236 enhancing performance through goal-setting and feedback interventions
to “acceptance”, “compliance” or “rejection” of goal-setting and feedback systems in
practice. He concludes that in the end acceptance highly depends on the congruence
of the basic values of management and the employees. By using a participative design
method there are many chances to find out whether the basic values of management
and employees are not too divergent to preclude the final acceptance of the system. A
good example is the so-called “approval meetings” in the design process of ProMES (see
Pritchard, 1990). The design team presents its proposal (i.e. key result areas, performance
indicators, contingencies) to the management. Most often very serious discussions arise
between management and the design team. These discussions reveal the basic expecta-
tions from both parties regarding their fundamental contribution to the organisation.
Another reason to use a participative design approach is the cognitive benefit of
getting better ideas on how to define valid performance indicators and how to improve
task strategies. Although Locke and Latham (1990) doubt the motivational (commit-
ment) effect of participation they agree with a possible cognitive benefit. Kleingeld
(1994) compared three experimental conditions in his study, using a quasi-experimental
design: a participation condition, a transportation condition (“transporting” the same
system to other units with only minimal participation) and a control condition. In the
participation condition performance increases were substantial and significant compared
to the control condition. Although performance in the transportation condition also in-
creased significantly compared to the control condition, this increase was significantly
smaller than the one obtained in the participation condition. He concludes that partici-
pation in the design of the system is the crucial factor. It should be noted that the units in
the transportation condition after a long time (more than a year) reached about the same
performance level as the units in the participation condition (however, attitudes towards
the system and the feedback it provided remained more positive in the participation
condition). It is not easy to disentangle the cognitive and the motivational effects of
participation from his data, but nevertheless participation seemed to be crucial for both
cognitive and motivational reasons.
Nowadays, in many organisations technology on the shop floor has become so complex
that it is virtually impossible to design a goal-setting and feedback system without
participation. This is simply because the expertise of shop floor employees is needed to
design valid performance indicators.
Van Tuijl (1997) refers to possible sources of resistance during each implementation
phase. He concludes that it is not easy to predict whether the reaction to a goal-setting and
feedback system will be one of acceptance, compliance or rejection. However, a number
of guidelines for the facilitator of the implementation process seem to be relevant:

explain and share the necessity of performance improvement;

demonstrate that people are a main source of performance variation;

be sure that management really wants to invest in the system, e.g. by providing

resources;
bring differences of opinion to the surface;

check whether the goal-setting and feedback system is compatible with other organi-

sational control systems, e.g. the reward system;
in case of lacking skills, provide training before and during development.

Following these guidelines can increase the chances of adoption of the goal-setting and
feedback system in the organisation.