MGT679 Employee Performance

Management (EPM)

Spring 2023

Lecture 1
Introduction to the module
Lecture’s Learning Objectives: 

• Understand what this module entails (content)

• Understand this module’s assessment
• Understand what critical thinking and analysis are with regard to
Employee Performance Management.
 Module’s objectives
Intended Learning Outcomes
 
Understand the relevance and importance of employee performance management in its
organizational and strategic contexts;
 
Conceptualize the different modalities of employee performance management – the bureaucratic, the
cybernetic/output-based, the cultural;
 
Critically evaluate the practical operation of these different modalities and their impact upon the
individual in organizational contexts;
 
Diagnose employee performance management problems and identify and evaluate remedial
interventions;
 
Critically evaluate contemporary debates about recent developments in the modalities of
performance management in the context of organizational change during periods of heightened
uncertainty.
How is the module delivered?

The delivery of the module is based on 10 lectures and 10 tutorials.

It is important that you engage with the materials we post every week and share on the
Discussion Board your comments, questions and answers to the questions we ask you. 

Please also check the Announcements page regularly.

Students are expected to attend all lectures and tutorials.

 Overview

Lectures
Date Topic Lecturer
08/02 Introduction to the module Diane Burns
15/02 Human capital Diane Burns
22/02 Motivating employees Diane Burns
01/03 Appraisal and reward Diane Burns
08/03 Employee voice and job design Diane Burns
15/03 The global and organizational context Diane Burns
22/03 Bureaucracy Diane Burns
29/03 Post-bureaucracy Diane Burns
26/04 Cultural control Diane Burns
03/05 Organisational democracy Diane Burns
 Overview
Tutorials
Check your timetable
Week starting on Topic Lecturer
16/02 Human Capital D. Burns/ F. Huang
23/02 Methods of motivating individuals and D. Burns/ F. Huang
teams
02/03 Implementing appraisal and assessment D. Burns/ F. Huang
and allocating reward
 
09/03 Designing jobs to promote ‘voice’ D. Burns/ F. Huang
16/03 Workforce planning in a global world D. Burns/ F. Huang
23/03 Bureaucratic modalities of management D. Burns/ F. Huang
30/03 Post-bureaucratic modalities of D. Burns/ F. Huang
management
27/04 Cultural control at work D. Burns/ F. Huang
04/05 Assignment Preparation Section A D. Burns/ F. Huang
11/05 Assignment Preparation Section B D. Burns/ F. Huang
 Assessment

A 3000-word assignment, consisting of two 1,500-word essays. Each part is weighted at 50%:

Section A.
 
Answer one question from this section, word-limit 1500.
 

Section B.
 
Answer one question from this section, word-limit 1500
 
 Submission Details for the Assignment

▪ Electronic submission only through Blackboard

▪ Include a completed cover sheet (Assessment on Blackboard)
▪ Title the file with your Student Registration Number and the Module Course Code: e.g.
200811001 MGT679_1
▪ The assignment number is 1
▪ Upload your assignment in good time. Do not wait until the last moment to submit. The
time of submission is taken from once the document has been successfully
uploaded. This may take more than five minutes during busy periods. Late penalties
will be applied to any work submitted from 12.01 p.m.
▪ You are reminded of the University's Regulations on the Use of Unfair Means, which
are outlined in the School's Handbooks and on the Coursework Specification Document
on Blackboard site for this module. This includes self plagiarism.
 Information, Interaction and Feedback

▪ Most questions about the module can be answered by looking in the

Module Guide.
▪ A lot of information about the assignment can be found in the
Coursework Specification Form.
▪ For any other questions and comments use the Discussion Board.
There is a discussion thread for each topic and the assignment.
▪ There are weekly group tutorials where you can seek the advice of
the tutor and ask questions
▪ Email d.burns@Sheffield.ac.uk to arrange an appointment in my office
hours.
 What is HRM?

The managing of people within employer-

employees relation (Kramar and Syed, 2012: 12)

Unitarist versus Pluralist Perspectives

A unitarist perspective views the employment relationship as one where both managers and employees have a
common purpose and the organization is integrated and harmonious.

A pluralist perspective emphasises competing interests, needs and aspirations among employers, managers
and employees.
Questions

What examples of mutual interests among the employer, the HR manager

and the employee are there?

What examples of different interests can you think of?

Source: Carbery and Cross (2013), p.9
 Organisations’ macro-environment
组织的宏观经济环境
• Socio-cultural context 社会文化背景
• Legal and political context 法律和政治背景
• Economic context 经济背景
• Technological context 技术背景

Can you think of how these different contexts might shape HR? Can you list
some examples?
 Changes in HRM

• Scientific Management
Personnel Management/
Personnel Administration
• Human Relations and OB approaches

• Strategic Human Resource Management

 科学管理从理性经济的角度看待人的动机
•Scientific Management takes a Rational Economic perspective regarding
human motivation:

•People will only work harder when they see that they will get more money
•Therefore a need to relate variations in effort to cash rewards
•Difficult to measure effort if people are doing complex tasks
• 只有当人们看到自己能得到更多的钱时，他们才会更加努力地工作
• 因此，需要将努力的变化与现金奖励联系起来
• 如果人们在做复杂的任务，很难衡量他们的努力
 TAYLOR’S FIVE BASIC PRESCRIPTIONS for EPM
将努力与奖励管理联系起来
1. To relate effort to reward management
2. Tasks must be simplified 任务必须简化
1.Broken down into their constituent units • 分解成它们的组成单位
2.Management identify “one best way” to perform tasks • 管理人员确定执行任务的“最佳方式”
• 从工人中去除概念和决策
3.Remove conception and decisions from workers • 任务的执行由规则驱动
4.Execution of tasks is driven by rules
员工必须专注于一些简单的任务，完成这些任务所需的努力是很容易衡量的
3. Employees must specialize in a few simplified tasks for which the required effort
to accomplish them is easily measured
将“科学计算”的现金奖励与所付出的努力联系起来
4. Relate “scientifically calculated” cash incentives to that amount of effort
选择身体上和心理上“正确”的员工
5. Select physically and psychologically “right” employees
 The McDonaldization Thesis
“ 理性组织”发展的进一步阶段
• McDonaldization is a further stage of the development of ‘rational organization’ which
represents the culmination of the scientific management started by Taylorism.

• The four key principles that underpin McDonaldization are:

效率 : 达到既定目标的最佳方法
1. Efficiency: the optimum means for achieving a given ends
可计算性 : 强调所销售的产品和所提供服务的数量方面
2. Calculability: an emphasis on the quantitative aspects of what is sold and service offered
可预测性 : 产品和服务在任何地方都是一样的
3. Predictability: products and services the same everywhere

4. Control: direct control over employees and customers through rules and layout of
restaurants. 控制 : 通过餐厅的规则和布局，直接控制员工和顾
客。
 人际关系和组织行为范式
Human Relations and organizational behaviour paradigms
人类行为的复杂性被引入到管理绩效的问题中 :
The complexity of human behaviour was introduced to the
issue of managing performance:
• Importance of social needs and aspirations
• Recognition of ‘informal’ organisation of work
• A ‘people-oriented’ approach to HRM (but still instrumental)
• 社会需求和愿望的重要性
• 承认“非正式”的工作组织
• 以人为本的人力资源管理方法 ( 但仍然是工具性的 )
 Strategic Human Resource Management (1990s)
• A response to large-scale organizational change and an intensely competitive
global economic environment 对大规模组织变革和激烈竞争的全球经济环境的回应
• Increased attention to how employees can have an impact on overall
performance 增加对员工如何影响整体绩效的关注

SHRM is “the process by which organizations seek to link the human, social and
intellectual capital of their members to the strategic needs of the firm.”
(Bamberger and Meshoulam, 2000, p.6) “本与企业的战略需求联系起来的过程。
组织寻求将其成员的人力、社会和智力资
”

This definition is based on a unitarist perspective: high levels of productivity which will
generate high profits and allow the payment of high wages
 SHRM

What are the links between HR practices and organisational performance?

HR practices are argued to be strategic if: （达成条件）

a) They contribute to organisational performance

b) They are aligned with the strategy of the organisation
(Boxall and Purcell, 2011).
 用于战略人力资源管理的观点和方法

Perspectives and Approaches

used in Strategic Human Resource Management

• The contingency perspective (Best Fit)

• The universalistic perspective (Best Practice)
• The configurational approach
• 权变视角 ( 最佳契合 )
• The resource-based view •
•
普遍观点 ( 最佳实践 )
配置方法
• 基于资源的视图
 The contingency perspective: Best-fit
权变视角 : 最佳契合

强调组织的人力资源政策和实践与其业务战略以及外部环境之间的偶然关系或一致性
• Emphasises the contingent relationship or alignment between
an organisation’s human resource policies and practices, and its
business strategy and in turn the external context
• Life cycle models emphasise the alignment of appropriate HR
policies and practices for the various life stages of a business.
生命周期模型强调为企业的不同生命阶段调整适当的人力资源政策和实践。
 Universalist Perspective: Best Practice
普遍主义观点 : 最佳实践

专注于一套人力资源管理“最佳实践”的存在，旨在创造和提高高水平的员工承诺和绩效
• Focuses on the existence of one set of HRM ‘best practices’ aimed at creating
and enhancing high levels of employee commitment and performance
• These will result in superior levels of organisational performance, regardless
of the context in which the organisation operates and the competitive
strategy of the firm 这将导致优越的组织绩效水平，无论在组织运作的背
景和企业的竞争战略

• Also known as HR System, High Commitment Management (HCM), High

Performance Work Systems (HPWS), High Involvement Management (HIM).
也被称为人力资源系统，高承诺管理 (HCM) ，高性能工作系统 (HPWS) ，高参与管理 (HIM) 。
 普遍主义视角 : 最佳实践方
Universalist Perspective: Best
法

Practice Approach

Pfeffer (1994) developed a list of 16 best practices which were

subsequently reduced to seven (1998) • 就业安全
• 选择招聘
• 自我管理团队 / 团队合作
1. employment security, • 高薪酬取决于组织绩效
2. selective hiring • 广泛的培训
• 减少地位差异
3. self-managed teams/team-working • 共享信息。
4. high compensation contingent on organisational performance
5. extensive training
6. reduction of status differentials
7. sharing information.
 The Best-Practice Approach
最佳实践方法
提高绩效的方法
HR best-practices, whether focussing on high commitment, high involvement or
high performance, will contribute to enhanced organisational performance
through
• Improved employee attitude and behaviours
• 改善员工的态度和行为
• Improved morale • 提高士气
• Higher levels of skill • 更高水平的技能
• 较低的人员流动率 / 缺勤
• Lower levels of turnover/absenteeism
率

Assumption that if employees have a strong commitment to the

organisational goals and values they will provide competitive
advantage.
 Performance
Management
“A strategy which relates to every activity of the organisation 绩效管理
set in the
context of its human resource policies, culture, style and communications
systems. The nature of the strategy depends on the organisational context
and can vary from organisation to organisation.” (Institute of Personnel
Management, 1992)
绩效管理系的特点
A performance management system has a number of characteristics:
• It communicated a vision of its objectives to all its employees.
• It set wider departmental and individual performance targets which were related to wider
objectives.
• It conducted a formal review of progress towards these targets.
• It used the review process to identify training, development and reward outcomes.
• It evaluated the whole process in order to improve effectiveness.
• It used formal appraisal procedures as ways of communicating performance requirements
which were set on a regular basis.
 Principles of Performance
Management
绩效管理原则
• It translates corporate goals into individual, team, department and divisional goals.
• It helps to clarify corporate objectives.
• It is a continuous and evolutionary process, in which performance improves over time.
• It relies on consensus and cooperation rather than control or coercion.
• It creates a shared understanding of what is required to improve performance and how it will
be achieved.
• It encourages self-management of individual performance.
• It requires a management style that is open and honest and encourages two-way
communication between superiors and subordinates.
• It requires continuous feedback.
• Feedback loops enable the experiences and knowledge gained on the job by individuals to
modify corporate objectives.
• It measures and assesses all performance against jointly agreed goals.
• It should apply to all staff.
• It is not primarily concerned with linking performance to financial reward.

Incomes Data Service (in Armstrong and Baron 2008: 11)

 From Personnel Management to
Contemporary HRM
Rhetoric or reality?
• Increased stress
• Decreased job satisfaction
• Decline in organisational commitment to work
• Precarious employment
• Increased inequalities
Redman, T and Wilkinson, A.
(2013) Chapter 1
 From Personnel Management to
Contemporary HRM
Rhetoric or reality?
Critical Management Studies: Key themes and critiques

Our shared belief is that management of the modern firm (and often of other types of
organizations too) is guided by a narrow goal—profits— rather than by the interests of
society as a whole, and that other goals— justice, community, human development,
ecological balance—should be brought to bear on the governance of economic
activity.
Paul S. Adler, Linda C. Forbes, and Hugh Willmott, 2007: 3 
Critical Management Studies. ANNALS, 1, 119–179, https://doi.org/10.5465/078559808
 From Personnel Management to
Contemporary HRM
Rhetoric or reality?
Critical Management Studies
Key themes and critiques
管理主义 - 关注雇主的需要和工人的工具性观点
Managerialism – focused on the needs of the employer and instrumental view of
workers
Apolitical – functionalist/objectivist
非政治 - 功能主义者 in support of the status quo and“an
/ 客观主义者支持现状和关于 assumption
真实世界 ”的假设
about the `real world’
Neo-Imperialist
新帝国主义——在其全球范围和实践中– in its global reach and practices.
Paul S. Adler, Linda C. Forbes, and Hugh Willmott, 2007: 3 
Critical Management Studies. ANNALS, 1, 119–179, https://doi.org/10.5465/078559808
 Where is management knowledge
produced?

Cartogram of author country affiliations

Murphy and Zhu 2012

 Where is management knowledge produced?

Top 10 countries of authors

Murphy and Zhu 2012

Global State of Peer Review Publons Report 2018
 Decolonising management research
What

Westocentric nature of Management and Organisation

Studies (Prasad 2003) 管理与组织研究的西方中心性质
Underpinning assumption of the west as the norm and the standard through which the rest
of the world can be studied, measured and analysed

Orientalism (Prasad 2009) 东方主义

If a non-western organisation does not deploy practices and/or policies considered
‘normal’ in the west, it is considered deficient, lacking and in need of training,
modernisation or innovation. If a non-western organisation makes use of practices
or policies unknown in the west, they are considered traditional or ethnic, and
usually – again – in need of innovation.

Orientalism and Occidentalism (Frenkel and Shenhav 2003)

东方主义和西方主义
If the Orientalist stance in management serves to stress the differences between the
west and the rest of the world, the Occidentalist attributes to management knowledge
a universal and objective validity.
 Characteristics of Critical Thinking

Defining a problem/concept

Asking questions

Examining evidence

Analyzing assumptions and biases

Avoiding oversimplification

Considering other interpretations

Tolerating ambiguity
SUMS Critical Analysis Toolkit
 Critical Thinking

• Means/ends
Power and
politics in MOS • Who is benefiting
• Impact on existing inequalities
• Status quo or transformation?
Readings on critical approaches
• Collings, D. and Wood, G (2009) Human Resource Management: A
Critical Approach. London: Routledge - Chapters 1 and 2
• Dar, S. et al. (2021) ‘The business school is racist: Act
up!’, Organization, 28(4), pp. 695–706. doi: 
10.1177/1350508420928521.
• Girei, E. (2017) ‘Decolonising management knowledge: A reflexive
journey as practitioner and researcher in Uganda’, Management
Learning, 48(4), pp. 453–470. doi: 10.1177/1350507617697867.
QUESTIONS?
Tutorial 1 – Wednesday 15th February
Human Capital: Required Reading to complete BEFORE the tutorial

O'Donovan, N. (2022) High-skill, high-wage hubris: why social investment

doesn’t guarantee shared prosperity
https://
eu.alma.exlibrisgroup.com/leganto/public/44SFD_INST/citation/1838371996
0001441?auth=SAML

Wright, P. Rediscovering the Human in strategic human capital.

https://
eu.alma.exlibrisgroup.com/leganto/public/44SFD_INST/citation/1743356654
0001441?auth=SAML