Performance Appraisal Procedural Justice: The Role of Manager's Implicit Person Theory

26 Pages Posted: 11 Apr 2011

See all articles by Peter A. Heslin

Peter A. Heslin

UNSW Sydney

Don Vandewalle

Southern Methodist University (SMU) - Management and Organizations Department

Abstract

Although there is a vast literature on employee reactions to procedural injustice, little is known about the important issue of why some managers are less procedurally just than others. In this field study we found that a manager’s implicit person theory (IPT; i.e., extent of assumption that people can change) predicted employees’ perceptions of the procedural justice with which their last performance appraisal was conducted. These procedural justice perceptions in turn predicted employees’ organizational citizenship behavior, as partially mediated by their organizational commitment. This research provides an initial empirical basis for a new line of inquiry that extends existing IPT theory into the realm of perceptual, attitudinal, and behavioral responses to people as a function of their IPT. Other contributions to the IPT, performance appraisal, and procedural justice literatures are discussed.

Keywords: implicit person theory, performance appraisals, procedural justice

Suggested Citation

Heslin, Peter A. and Vandewalle, Don, Performance Appraisal Procedural Justice: The Role of Manager's Implicit Person Theory. Journal of Management, Forthcoming , UNSW Australian School of Business Research Paper No. 2011 MGMT 01, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1804870

Peter A. Heslin (Contact Author)

UNSW Sydney ( email )

UNSW Business School
High St
KENSINGTON, NSW 2052
Australia

Don Vandewalle

Southern Methodist University (SMU) - Management and Organizations Department ( email )

United States

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