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Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the connection between performance management and employee engagement. More specifically, the authors address shortcomings in prior literature where employee performance has been controlled narrowly as cognitive task accomplishment. Accumulating evidence shows, however, that such performance-mediating factors as employee engagement constitute critical antecedents of employee and organizational performance. They can most effectively be influenced by attending sensitively to employees’ individual differences, which are ultimately driven by motifs and dispositions. Design/methodology/approach The study takes a quantitative approach to exploring predictors of employee engagement. The analysis is based on a sample of 503 online survey respondents from knowledge-intensive organizations. Findings The results indicate that employee engagement is driven more by employees’ inherent attributes than environmental factors. The analysis refuted the connection between engagement and social orientation, self-regulation and conscientiousness. Instead, the factors associating with employee engagement were analytical thinking, extroversion, systems thinking, assertiveness and leadership. Practical implications In this paper, the authors put forth a novel conceptual model of performance management, introducing new and evidence-based foci for effective people management that expand task performance to contextual performance and supplement quantifying approaches to performance control with the qualifying methodology. Originality/value Departing from the previously dominating frameworks of performance management that focused on task performance, this work extends to contextual performance and considers also employees’ psychological traits.

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The Innovation University (IU) -to be called the Aalto University after Alvav Aalto, a famous Finnish architect and MIT professor -is a new university which will be created through a merger of three existing universities: the Helsinki University of Technology (TKK), the Helsinki School of Economics (HSE) and the University of Art and Design Helsinki (TAIK). The commitment to this reform can be summed with one figure: start-up funding is 700 MEUR coming from the government and industry. The objectives set for the IU require long-term development of operations in a way that makes societal interaction and in particular, effectiveness serving working life an integral part of all the operations. This cannot be achieved without education and development services essential to working life competencies, meeting also shortterm competency challenges and representing international top level. Themes, research topics and ways of working crossing boundaries will be nurtured within the focus areas of the new university. These facilitate comprehension of how knowledge and skills acquired through various disciplines are to be integrated into the teaching and learning practices. The IU is the developer of new learning environments and a determined promoter of lifelong learning. The new university will position itself within the core of global competition, as an active interaction node and meeting forum for the international academic community and the most noteworthy networks formed by global companies. In selected key areas, the new university will volunteer to act and take a role as the network orchestrator.