When Performance Doesn't Count: A Meta-Analytic Investigation of Performance-Based Promotion
Open Access
- Author:
- Yiu, Shun
- Graduate Program:
- Human Resources and Employment Relations
- Degree:
- Master of Science
- Document Type:
- Master Thesis
- Date of Defense:
- March 22, 2019
- Committee Members:
- Sumita Raghuram, Thesis Advisor/Co-Advisor
Jean Marie Phillips, Committee Member
Kameron Carter, Committee Member - Keywords:
- Promotion
Job performance
Meta-analysis - Abstract:
- Reliance on performance as a criterion for promotion judgments could be constrained by the firm-level uncertainties associated with using individual past performance criteria. In order to alleviate the inability to infer competence when there are uncertainties in past performance, firms rely on criteria other than past performance to make promotion judgments. As a result, this thesis hypothesized that the promotion decisions would be less performance-based when there are uncertainties associated with individual past performance. I conceptualized two forms of uncertainties in past performance: exogenous uncertainty and endogenous uncertainty. Exogenous uncertainty relates to the labor mobility experienced by a firm and endogenous uncertainty relates to the incomparability of past performance. I tested my hypotheses by examining the moderating effects of exogenous and endogenous uncertainties on the relationship between performance and promotion with a meta-analysis of extant empirical studies. I treated each study as a data point that reflect the promotion practice of a firm. The results indicate that the industrial characteristics of a firm and performance variability in a firm are significant moderators of the performance-promotion relationship. Organization size is also a significant moderator, but the direction of moderation was opposite to what is being hypothesized. Supplementary analysis revealed curvilinear moderation effects for average employee tenure and performance variability. The results are discussed in relation to the extant literature on resource dependence theory and human resource management. Alternative explanations are discussed to address findings that are contradictory to my hypotheses. Practical implications in relation to promotion practices and individual career management are also discussed. Finally, I addressed the limitations of the present study and proposed avenues for future research.