Zone of Acceptance under Performance Measurement: Does Performance Information Affect Employee Acceptance of Management Authority?

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Nielsen, Poul Aaes; Jacobsen, Christian Botcher
• 署名单位: University of Southern Denmark; Aarhus University
• 刊物名称: PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION REVIEW
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0033-3352
• DOI: 10.1111/puar.12947
• 发表日期: 2018
• 页码: 684-693
• 关键词: Leadership; perceptions; attribution; GOVERNMENT; DEMOCRACY; feedback; CHARISMA; ROMANCE; Blame

摘要

Public sector employees have traditionally enjoyed substantial influence and bargaining power in organizational decision making, but few studies have investigated the formation of employee acceptance of management authority. Drawing on the romance of leadership perspective, the authors argue that performance information shapes employee attributions of leader quality and perceptions of a need for change in ways that affect their acceptance of management authority, conceptualized using Simon's notion of a zone of acceptance. A survey experiment was conducted among 1,740 teachers, randomly assigning true performance information about each respondent's own school. When employees were exposed to signals showing low or high performance, their acceptance of management authority increased, whereas average performance signals reduced employee acceptance of management authority. The findings suggest that performance measurement can alter public sector authority relations and have implications regarding how public managers can use performance information strategically to gain acceptance of management authority and organizational change.