Introduction: The analytic and nonanalytic frameworks for performance appraisal

Abstract

It seems fair to state that a general restlessness or uneasiness surrounds the current performance appraisal literature. Although performance appraisal is recognized by scientists and practitioners alike as an important component of modern organizations, and continues to receive considerable research attention, there is a growing concern over the direction in which appraisal research is headed (Balzer & Sulsky 1990; Banks & Murphy 1985; Napier & Latham 1986). Much of the research conducted over the last decade has explored cognitive processes and factors influencing appraisal judgments. Arguably, we now have a better understanding of the general appraisal process than we did 15 years ago, prior to Landy and Farr's (1980) influential call for a process approach to performance appraisal (see DeNisi & Williams 1988; Lord & Maher 1989, for recent reviews). As process-oriented research continues, however, criticisms that this research lacks generalizability and offers few suggestions for improving actual performance appraisal procedures in organizations have become more frequent (Balzer & Sulsky 1990; Banks & Murphy 1985; Bernardin & Villanova 1986; Murphy & Cleveland 1991). In fact, performance appraisal has been used as an illustrative example of the wide gulf that often exists between practitioners and scientists in industrial/organizational psychology (Dunnette 1990; Lapointe 1990). This special issue of Human Resource Management Review addresses the question of how to design “real world” performance appraisal systems and contrasts cognitive- or process-based perspectives (referred to here as the non-analytic or intuitive approach) with noncognitive or analytic perspectives.