What Drives Perceived Fairness of Performance Appraisal? Exploring the Effects of Psychological Contract Fulfillment on Employees’ Perceived Fairness of Performance Appraisal in U.S. Federal Agencies

Abstract

While the recent literature acknowledges the importance of performance appraisal fairness in high-performing organizations, one of the major challenges facing human resource management (HRM) is establishing both an effective and a fair performance appraisal system; yet little is known about the key organizational and psychological factors that affect employees’ perception of performance appraisal fairness, especially in public organizations. In regards to employees’ perception of performance appraisal fairness, most studies have focused on the structural factors rather than the cognitive or psychological perspectives. Particularly, one of the key overlooked factors driving employees’ perceived fairness of performance appraisal is psychological contract fulfillment, which describes the expectations between an employee and the employer and what each gives and expects in return from the other. This study examines whether psychological contract fulfillments are associated with employees’ perceived fairness of performance appraisals in U.S. federal agencies. Using the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey, this study finds that psychological contract fulfillments have a positive impact on federal employees’ perceived fairness of performance appraisals.

Role ambiguity and perceptions of unfair performance appraisals: mitigating roles of personal resources

“…Different factors may shape employees’ beliefs that they are being appraised unfairly, including a lack of compensation parity (Leung, Lin, and Lu ), unfulfilled psychological contracts (Harrington and Lee ), or poor quality relationships with organizational leaders (Reinke ). These factors generally evoke stress, because they constitute negative work circumstances.…”

“…The principal goal of this study is to create a better understanding of why some employees might be more likely than others to develop beliefs about unfair performance appraisals, defined herein as the perception that they are held accountable for issues or problems over which they have limited control (Folger and Cropanzano 2001). Different factors may shape employees' beliefs that they are being appraised unfairly, including a lack of compensation parity (Leung, Lin, and Lu 2014), unfulfilled psychological contracts (Harrington and Lee 2015), or poor quality relationships with organizational leaders (Reinke 2003). These factors generally evoke stress, because they constitute negative work circumstances.…”

Performance Appraisal for Employee Development: Exploring Perceptions of Supervisors

“…Due to the existing By-Laws, supervisors lose the opportunity to discuss the areas they need to improve on; thus, the fairness of the performance appraisal system further loses its credibility. Perceived fairness of performance appraisal has been classified with distributive, procedural, and interactional justice by organizational justice theory in which the procedural justice stresses on the impartiality of the performance appraisal process regardless of the results (Harrington & Lee, 2015). The weakness prevails with concerning fairness of the process despite the hesitation of a couple of participants in disclosing weaknesses in depth.…”

The Relationship Between Psychological Contract Breach, Organizational Identification, and Organizational Agility Among Nursing Faculty Members

“…The instrument was developed by the researchers after thorough review of related literature [40][41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50][51][52][53][54]. It has 40 statements on a 5 point-Likert scale where (5=Strongly agree and 1=Strongly Disagree).…”