The Influence of Performance Management on Teamwork: The Importance of Climate Strength

Purpose - Organizations are increasingly expecting that employees work in teams, while keeping traditional performance management, i.e. the continuous process of setting goals for, monitoring and evaluating employees, in place. However, the compatibility of traditional performance management and teamwork remains largely unknown and is even doubted (Buckingham & Goodall, 2015). Therefore, this study examines if performance management stimulates team citizenship behaviour, a specific team process that supports the social and psychological environment in which task performance can take place (Podsakoff et al., 2014). Research objectives - Based on the HRM strength theory (Bowen and Ostroff, 2004) and an exploratory study, we theorize that the performance management process increases teamwork, through its effect on climate strength. Climate strength refers to how shared perceptions of performance management are in a team. Bowen and Ostroff (2004) argue that when the HRM process, referring to the design and implementation of HRM, is high on distinctiveness, consistency and consensus, climate strength is more likely to emerge. Consequently, we assume that features of the performance management process, and more specifically vertical alignment, related to distinctiveness, horizontal alignment, related to consistency and two-way communication and constructive feedback, related to consensus, will predict climate strength within teams. Second, we assume that climate strength establishes a better understanding about the teamwork processes that organizations expect, leading to a higher demonstration of team citizenship behaviour. Method To test these relationships, a quantitative study is conducted at the Belgium Police Force. The Police Force is depending on their teams’ effectiveness, which makes them an excellent case for the study. Data collection started in March 2017 and is still ongoing. Preliminary results - Due to the ongoing data collection, we were not able to include the final analyses and results. Preliminary analyses demonstrate that the features of the performance management process, i.e. vertical alignment, horizontal alignment, two-way communication and constructive feedback were related to climate strength. In addition, we also found a positive relationship between climate strength and team citizenship behaviour. We were not able to find a direct mediating effect of climate strength, but we do find some evidence for an indirect mediating effect between the performance management process and team citizenship behaviour. Limitations - Whereas team citizenship behaviour is found to be related to performance outcomes such as lower intention to leave (Chen et al., 2005) and team performance (Choi, 2009), this study is not able to demonstrate a relationship with performance outcomes. Further research could focus on this relationship. Conclusion - This study provides insights into the effects of performance management on teamwork citizenship behaviour. These findings will help team-structured organizations to make performance management more effective