Motivating raters through work design: Applying the job characteristics model to the performance appraisal context

Abstract

In general, raters are responsible for evaluating their subordinates’ performance and delivering their final performance ratings. As most organizations prefer accurate ratings, past research has focused on encouraging raters to produce more accurate appraisals. Extant research on rater motivations has highlighted the various factors affecting rating accuracy, but the job characteristics of appraisals represent an unexplored area. The current study attempts to extend the rater motivation research by introducing a work design perspective of appraisal and exploring the ways in which the job characteristics of appraisals can be used to motivate raters. First, rater motivation theory and Hackman and Oldham’s job characteristics model (JCM) are reviewed. Then, the current study illustrates how the JCM can be applied to the performance appraisal context.

Keywords:

• performance appraisal
• job characteristics model
• rater accountability

Public Interest Statement

Most organizations prefer accurate performance ratings over inaccurate ones. For that reason, motivating performance raters to produce more accurate appraisal has been a popular research topic. Such research is often called as the rater motivation literature. The current study attempts to extend the rater motivation research by introducing a work design perspective of appraisal. The basic assumption is that the job characteristics of performance appraisal as a task of a supervisor can be designed to provide incentives for raters to rate their subordinates more accurately.

Competing Interest

The author declares no competing interests.

Additional information

Funding

Funding. The author received no direct funding for this research.

Notes on contributors

Seejeen Park

Seejeen Park is an assistant professor at the Department of Public Administration, Kwangwoon University. He has an MPA from Syracuse University and a PhD in public administration from the Florida State University. His main research interests include organizational psychology, organization theory, human resource management, and public management. His recent research topics are related to rater accountability, rater motivation in appraisal context, and evaluation of pay-for-performance system.