ArticlePDF Available

Abstract and Figures

Goal‐setting is among the most valid and practical theories of employee motivation. This conclusion has been reached by multiple authors working independently. The conclusion is based on the fact that the theory has been shown to predict, influence, and explain the behavior of over 40,000 people in numerous countries (e.g., Australia, Canada, the Caribbean, England, Germany, Israel, Japan, and the United States), in both laboratory and field settings, involving at least 88 different tasks in occupations that included logging, word processing, engineering, and teaching in a university. Although developed as a theory of motivation in the workplace, it has been used effectively in sport psychology. Most recently the theory has been found useful for promoting the motivational processes of brain‐injured patients.
Content may be subject to copyright.
c09.indd 161 6/17/09 6:44:02 PM
9
Motivate Employee Performance
through Goal Setting
GARY P. L ATHAM
Goal setting theory (Latham and Locke, 2007 ) provides a framework that specifi es the
most valid and practical ways of increasing employee motivation. This conclusion has
been reached by multiple authors working independently (e.g. Earley and Lee, 1992 ;
Miner, 1984 ; Pinder, 2008 ). The conclusion is based on the fact that the theory has been
shown in more than 1000 studies to predict, influence, and explain the behavior of thou-
sands of people in numerous countries (e.g. Australia, Canada, the Caribbean, England,
Germany, Israel, Japan, and the USA), in both laboratory and field settings, involving
more than 100 different tasks in occupations that included logging, word processing,
engineering, and university scholarship (Locke and Latham, 1990 ; Mitchell and Daniels,
2003 ). Although developed as a theory of motivation in the workplace, it has been used
effectively in sport psychology (Weinberg, 1994 ). The theory has even been found use-
ful for promoting the motivational processes of brain - injured patients (Gauggel, 1999 ;
Prigatano, Wong, Williams, and Plenge, 1997 ).
MAIN PRINCIPLE
The theory states that the simplest, most direct motivational explanation of why some
people perform better than others is because they have different performance goals
(Latham and Locke, 1991 ). The essence of the theory is four- fold (Locke and Latham,
1990 ). First, diffi cult specific goals lead to significantly higher performance than easy
goals, no goals, or even the setting of an abstract goal such as urging people to do their
best. Second, holding ability constant, as this is a theory of motivation, and given that
there is goal commitment, the higher the goal the higher the performance. Third, person-
ality traits and incentives influence an individual ’s behavior, at least in part, to the extent
that they lead to the setting of and commitment to a specifi c difficult goal. Fourth, goal
setting, in addition to affecting the three mechanisms of motivation, namely, choice, effort,
c09.indd 162 6/17/09 6:44:03 PM
162 G ARY P. LATHAM
and persistence, can also have a cognitive benefit. It can influence the motivation to dis-
cover ways to attain the goal (Seijts and Latham, 2005 ).
SUBPRINCIPLES
There are at least four subprinciples necessary for deriving the motivational benefi ts of
goal setting. The goal must be challenging and specific, feedback must be provided on
progress in relation to goal attainment, ways must be found to maintain goal commitment,
and resources must be provided for and obstacles removed to goal attainment.
Set challenging specific goals
The goal must be both challenging and specific. Given adequate ability and commit-
ment to the goal, the higher the goal the higher the performance. This is because people
normally adjust their level of effort to the difficulty of the goal. In addition to being
targets to attain, goals are the standards by which one judges one ’s adequacy or suc cess.
Challenging goals facilitate pride in accomplishment. People with low goals are mini -
mally satisfied with low performance attainment, and become increasingly satisfi ed with
every level of attainment that exceeds their goal. This is also true for individuals with a
high goal. To be minimally satisfied, they must accomplish more than those who have
a low goal. Consequently, they set a high goal to attain before they will be satisfi ed with
their accomplishment. In short, to be satisfied, employees with high standards must accom-
plish more than those with low standards. In addition, an employee ’s outcome expect-
ancies are typically higher for the attainment of high rather than low goals because the
outcome one can expect from attaining a challenging goal usually includes such factors
as an increase in feelings of self - efficacy, personal effectiveness, recognition from peers, a
salary increase, a job promotion, etc. As a result people, in most instances, readily commit to
a high goal if they believe they have the ability to attain it.
Goal specificity facilitates an employee ’s focus in that it makes explicit what it is the
individual should choose to do or try to accomplish. If the goal specifies A, then B and
C will be downplayed. Specificity also facilitates measurement or feedback on progress
toward goal attainment. A drawback of an abstract goal such as do your best is that
it allows people to give themselves the benefit of the doubt concerning the adequacy of
their performance (Kernan and Lord, 1988). Thus their maximum effort is not aroused.
For feedback to be used intelligently, it must be interpreted in relation to a specifi c goal.
Goal specifi city clarifi es for employees what constitutes effective performance.
For goal setting to be maximally effective, the goal and the measure of performance
effectiveness used must be aligned. Thus, if a logging crew wants to increase productiv-
ity by 15%, the performance measure must be the number of trees cut down divided by
the hours worked. If the director of an organization’s RandD division wishes to increase
line managers satisfaction with the unit, the goal set can be a specific increase in the fre-
quency of behaviors emitted that have been identified through job analysis as necessary
for line management ’s satisfaction. Goals and the measures of their attainment that have
appeared in the scientific literature include physical effort, quantity and quality measures
of production, costs, profi ts, and job behaviors.
c09.indd 163 6/17/09 6:44:03 PM
163MOTIVATE EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE THROUGH GOAL SETTING
Challenging, specific goals affect effort and persistence (Latham and Locke, 1991 , 2007 ).
When no time limits are imposed, a specific high goal induces people to work harder or
longer than is the case when a low or abstract goal is set. Without time limits, a specifi c
high goal induces people to work until the goal is attained. With time limits, diffi cult spe-
cific goals lead to more effort per unit of time. The American Pulpwood Association found
that when paper companies impose quotas on the number of days that they will buy wood
from pulpwood crews, the crews cut as much wood in the restricted number of days as they
do in a normal five- day work week (Latham and Locke, 1975 ).
In summary, setting specific challenging goals is important for increasing both job per-
formance and job satisfaction. Job satisfaction is the result of an appraisal of one ’s
performance against one ’s goals. Job satisfaction is not a result of the person alone or the
job alone, but of the person in relation to the job. To the extent that one ’s job perform-
ance is appraised as fulfilling or facilitating the attainment of one ’s goals, satisfaction is
high (Latham and Brown, 2006 ; Latham, Locke, and Fassina, 2002 ). For example, in a
study conducted in Germany, there were no data to suggest that those who had high goals
experienced feelings of exhaustion. Only those employees who perceived their goals were
difficult to attain experienced an increase in positive and a decrease in negative effect,
an increase in job satisfaction, and perceptions of occupational success over a three - year
timeframe. An unexpected finding was that lack of goal attainment in one ’s personal life
was related to higher degrees of subjective well - being when the person experienced goal
progress on the job (Wiese and Freund, 2005 ).
Provide feedback in relation to goals
A truism attributed to the late Mason Haire is that which gets measured gets done. This
is because the act of measurement conveys cogently what the organization truly values ver-
sus what it may state that it values. However, the accuracy of Haire s statement is improved
through the insertion of the word goals: that which is measured in relation to goals is done.
Both goal setting theory and empirical research indicate that in the absence of goal setting,
feedback has no effect on performance. This is because feedback is only information; its effect
on action depends on how it is appraised and what decisions are made with respect to it.
For example, the Weyerhaeuser Company found that engineers and scientists who were
urged to do their best after receiving a performance appraisal performed no better than
their counterparts in a control group. A significant increase in performance occurred only
among those engineers and scientists who received feedback in relation to specifi c high
goals (Latham, Mitchell, and Dossett, 1978 ).
Feedback moderates the effect of goal setting. Without feedback, the positive benefi t of
goal setting is minimized (Erez, 1977 ). This is because goals direct effort and persistence.
Feedback allows people to discern what they should continue doing, stop doing, or start
doing to attain the goal.
Gain goal commitment
Commitment is the sine qua non of goal setting. Without it, goal setting is a meaningless
exercise. Two primary ways to gain commitment are to focus on an individual ’s outcome
expectancies and self - efficacy (see Chapter 10 , this volume) .
c09.indd 164 6/17/09 6:44:03 PM
164 G ARY P. LATHAM
A downside of setting challenging specific goals is that people may obtain tangible evi-
dence that they did not attain them. A teenager may have test scores that provide strong
evidence of failure in math. An employee in a consulting firm may have hours and hours
of wasted effort, non - billable hours, on a potential client who subsequently took the busi-
ness to a competitor. The result can be feelings of loss of control. People learn on the basis
of evidence (e.g. revenue, client surveys, staff turnover) that they have failed to attain their
goal no matter how much they truly tried to attain it. Through such repeated experiences
they typically learn to give up; they learn helplessness. Thus there are employees who
have learned that they cannot increase revenue from existing clients, they have learned
that they are poor at bringing in new clients, and that they are not able to work effectively
with staff. They have tangible evidence to support their conclusions that they should give
up their attempts to attain their goal.
The solutions for maintaining goal commitment are at least two - fold. A fi rst step,
as noted above, is to focus on outcome expectancies. The role of a coach is to help people
see the relationship between what they do and the outcome of their actions; to help
people realize the outcomes that they can expect as a result of what they do. An early
example of how outcome expectancies affect goal commitment can be found in a study by
Lashley ( 1929 ). A man, after 900 repetitions, was still unable to master the alphabet. But
after he was offered 100 cigarettes if he could learn the alphabet in a week, he proceeded
to do so in only 10 trials.
Because the concept of outcome expectancies is as useful in one ’s personal life as it is
in an organizational setting, allow me to share a personal example. I arrived home one
day to discover my four children on the front step. They greeted me with the warning
not to enter the house as Mom was in a horrific mood. As she had walked across the
kitchen fl oor, her foot had come out of a shoe that had stuck to dried milk. As she fell, her
hand braced her from injury as it slipped into an open dishwasher that oozed with leftover
breakfast food.
To announce that I will solve the problem would not only have been lunacy on my
part, it would have fostered dependence: Let ’s wait until Dad gets here; he can fi x any-
thing. To look for blame would have been equally fool - hardy on my part: So what did
you do to get your mother in such a bad mood? “ I don ’ t know. ” “ It wasn ’ t me. ” “ She is
always in a bad mood. I bet you did something, Dad.
The primary job of a coach is to improve performance rather than focus on blame.
This is done through increasing the person’s sense of control regarding the attainment
of their goals. It is done by helping people to realize the outcomes they can expect from
engaging in specific actions. Thus, I simply asked each of them: What can you do within
the next 30 seconds to improve Mom ’s mood? Setting a goal focuses attention on discov-
ering solutions to its attainment.
One son offered to clean the kitchen, another said he would get us both a drink, the
third said he would make dinner. My daughter quietly ran off to prepare a bath for my
wife. The outcome, as expected, was a dramatic upswing in my wife ’s affect and behavior.
A four cell empathy box can be used to understand: (1) the outcomes an employee
expects from committing to a goal, (2) the negative outcomes expected from goal com-
mitment, (3) the positive outcomes expected from sticking with the status quo, and (4) the
negative outcomes expected from doing so. Understanding outcome expectancies enabled
a forest products company to shift the dishonest (theft) to honest behavior in the workforce
c09.indd 165 6/17/09 6:44:04 PM
165 MOTIVATE EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE THROUGH GOAL SETTING
Outcome Expectancies
Positive Negative
Goal
Commitment
Goal Rejection
1? 2?
3? 4?
5?
FIGURE 9.1 The empathy box
(Latham, 2001 ). The empathy box is shown in Figure 9.1 . The fi ve questions asked
are as follows: (1) What positive outcomes do you expect from committing to and pursu-
ing the goal? (2) What negative outcomes do you expect from committing to and pursuing
the goal? (3) What positive outcomes do you expect from rejecting or ignoring the goal?
(4) What negative outcomes do you expect from rejecting or ignoring the goal? (5) What
would have to change for you to commit to the goal (look for answers in cells 2 and 3)?
This empathy box provides a systematic way to walk in another person’s shoes. To
the extent that you understand the outcomes an individual or team expects, you will begin
to understand their behavior. To the extent that you are able to change the outcomes they
expect, you will be able to change their behavior given the person or team has the confi -
dence they can do so. This leads us to the second concept, self - effi cacy.
A second step to maintaining goal commitment is to increase the person’s self - efficacy
(Bandura, 1997 ; 2001). Self - efficacy is the conviction that one can mobilize one ’ s resources
to attain a specific performance level. I can cause . . . , I can bring about . . . I can make
happen. . . . ” Self - efficacy is different from self - esteem in that the latter refers to judgments
of self worth: How much does Pat like Pat? Further, self - esteem is a general trait where as
self - effi cacy is task specifi c. The two are not necessarily directly related.
Pat may have low self - esteem due to a variety of events that have occurred in Pat ’s
past. Pat has said and done things that are deeply regretted. For these reasons no one dis-
likes Pat today more than Pat. Nevertheless, Pat believes (high self - effi cacy) that there is no
one who is as effective in bringing in new business to the firm. Conversely, Pat may love
Pat, yet she may have low self - efficacy in the ability to make a persuasive presentation to a
potential client. Furthermore, because self - efficacy is task specific, an individual may have
high self - effi cacy on ability to work effectively with staff, low self - effi cacy on working effec-
tively with clients, and moderate self - effi cacy on ability to work effectively within the fi rm.
c09.indd 166 6/17/09 6:44:05 PM
166 G ARY P. LATHAM
People who have problems with self - esteem should be referred to a clinical psychol ogist.
People who have low self - efficacy for attaining a specific, high goal can be coached by you
in the workplace.
Bandura ( 2001 ) has shown that it is not just our ability that holds us back or propels
us forward, it is also our perception of our ability. People with low self - efficacy look for
tan gible evidence to abandon a goal. A failure is confirmation that it is useless to persist
in goal attainment. Conversely, people with high self - efficacy commit to high goals. They
view obstacles and setbacks to goal attainment as challenges to overcome, as sources of
excitement to be savored.
A possible indicator of low self - efficacy is self - denigration of one ’ s ability. Statements
such as I can’t deal with a personal computer may indicate low self - effi cacy.
High self - efficacy can be induced in the workplace in at least three ways, enactive
mastery, modeling, and persuasion from a significant other. Enactive mastery involves
sequencing a task in such a way that all but guarantees early successes for an individual.
For example, to increase confidence in the use of a laptop, the following steps should be
followed: (a) open/close, (b) on/off, (c) keyboard skills, (d) save. Early successes through
“ small wins build confi dence that I can do this, my goal is indeed attainable.
An effective coach does not abandon an employee during the early stages of learn -
ing to attain a goal. To leave the employee to master keyboard skills before teaching the
process of save” is to provide the employee with a reason for abandoning the laptop in
favor of pen and paper. All that was typed is lost forever when the laptop is turned off
in the absence of knowledge of the necessity to save.
The concepts of outcome expectancy and self - efficacy are often applied together. If the
person hates the traditional snail mail system, show how hitting a key on the computer
will send material any place in the world in seconds. In short, enable the person to see
the relationship between mastery of the laptop and the desired outcome the person can
expect. Then give the person confi dence to do so through the sequencing of the tasks.
A second way to increase self - efficacy regarding goal attainment is through the use of
models. The job of coach is to find people with whom the goal setter identifi es, who have either
mastered the task or are in the process of doing so. Note that the word identifies is italicized.
Directing a manager who is struggling in the development of staff to another manager who
has the “ magic touch with staff may not increase self - efficacy. It may even backfire as a
coaching technique if this is all that is done. The person who is struggling may give up after
concluding that I will never acquire that magic touch . Directing this manager to visit an
additional colleague who has struggled recently in the past, and has subsequently improved
the performance of staff, is more likely to increase the belief that if she can, so can I.
For the same reason, visiting a benchmark company can sometimes be a demotivat-
ing experience. The idea underlying benchmarking is to minimize reinventing the wheel
on the part of people in other organizations. Through benchmarking, the acquisition of
knowledge is accelerated. But, the downside of benchmarking is that visitors can leave full
of admiration for what they have witnessed, and demoralized because they are convinced
that they do not have the ability to model it: Their management system is different from
ours. Their union contract is nothing like ours. There is no way that we can be like them.
To increase their self - efficacy you must find an organization, in addition to the one that
will be used as a benchmark, with whom employees can identify an organization that has
previously done poorly but has significantly improved its performance relative to
c09.indd 167 6/17/09 6:44:05 PM
167 MOTIVATE EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE THROUGH GOAL SETTING
that benchmark, or is in the process of doing so. Finding and visiting this additional
organization increases the belief that if they can, so can we.
The American Pulpwood Association found that supervisory presence and support is also a
key to goal commitment and productivity (Ronan, Latham, and Kinne, 1973 ). When the
goal is assigned by a supportive authority figure, goal commitment and performance are
high (Latham and Saari, 1979a ). These ndings are supported by a meta - analysis that
showed a 56% average gain in productivity when management commitment to a MBO
program is high versus a 6% increase when their commitment is low (Rodgers and Hunter,
1991 ). Thus, it is not surprising that Bandura (see Chapter 10 ) found that a third way of
increasing self - efficacy is through persuasion from a significant other. People tend to behave
in accordance with the expectations of those people who are significant to them. Assigned
goals themselves usually lead to high goal commitment because listening to the assignment
without objection is in itself a form of consent (Salancik, 1977 ). Assigning the goal implies
that the recipient is capable of attaining it, which in turn increases the person’ s self - effi cacy
regarding the task.
Bandura, a past president of the American Psychological Association, and a past hon-
orary president of the Canadian Psychological Association, addressed a classroom of
executives as follows:
We know that intelligence is fixed. You either have it or you don’t. We are going to
put you through a simulation consisting of tasks that you typically confront as CEOs.
I know you will fi nd these tasks frustrating and seemingly impossible.
In an adjoining room, he addressed the other half of the class of executives as follows:
We know that intelligence is not fixed. Intelligence is the ability to apply what you
have learned on previous tasks to present ones. We are going to put you through a
simulation consisting of tasks that you typically confront as CEOs. I know that you will
nd these tasks challenging and fun.
Several hours later he pushed back the dividing wall. The people in the second group
were laughing among themselves as to how similar the simulation was to their daily work
lives, and how much they had learned from their experiences that afternoon. The people
in the first group were truly angry and frustrated. They demanded to be allowed to go
through the same simulation as the second group before their four weeks of executive
education at Stanford came to a close. The simulation that they had gone through, they
claimed, was not similar at all to what they encountered on their jobs, and hence was a
waste of their time.
In short, both groups behaved in accordance with Bandura ’s expectations of them,
despite the fact that the simulation was identical for both groups. In less than a minute,
Bandura ’s expectations of one group of executives ruined their afternoon and for the
other group he had the opposite effect.
A coach may or may not be a significant other for the person who is being coached.
Thus a role of you as a coach is to determine the identity of the person’s signifi cant other,
and have that individual or individuals communicate, if true, why they believe the person
can attain a specifi c high goal.
The most powerful significant other is one ’ s self. Verbal self - guidance (VSG) or functional
self - talk can increase or debilitate self - confidence in goal attainment. We are often our
c09.indd 168 6/17/09 6:44:06 PM
168 G ARY P. LATHAM
worst enemy. Millman and Latham ( 2001 ) trained displaced managers to systematically
monitor their self - talk to exclude negative comments and increase positive ones with
respect to job attainment. Within nine months, 48% of the people who were trained
obtained a job that paid $ 10,000 of their previous job; only one person of eight in the
control group was able to do so. The self - efficacy of the participants in the group who
were trained in functional self - talk was significantly higher than those in the control group.
Similar results have been obtained for Aboriginals in Canada (Latham and Budworth,
2006). Training in VSG also turned highly competitive MBA students into team players
(Latham and Brown, 2006 ).
The order in which these two steps, outcome expectancies and self - effi cacy, should be
implemented varies by individual. If outcome expectancies are already high, this step may
be skipped. Focus immediately on ways of increasing self - efficacy if the person lacks con-
dence that the goal is attainable.
Provide resources needed to attain the goal
Goals are unlikely to be attained if situational constraints blocking their attainment are
not removed. Thus the organization needs to ensure that the time, money, people, and
equipment necessary for goal attainment exist. Most importantly the measurement system
must not only allow accurate tracking of goal progress, it must be aligned with and be
supportive of goal attainment.
For example, a newly hired professor may set a goal to receive a mean score of 5 or
higher on a 7 - point scale of teaching effectiveness rated by students. If the measurement
system for promotion and tenure focuses primarily on publications in mainstream aca-
demic journals, and resources are provided primarily for conducting research, commit-
ment to this teaching goal may quickly wane.
Arguably, among the most important resources necessary for accruing the positive
benefits of goal setting is the employee ’s ability. Organizations must provide the neces-
sary training to give people the knowledge and skill to attain the goal. This is because the
relation of goal difficulty to performance is curvilinear. Performance levels off after
the limit of ability has been reached (Locke, Fredrick, Buckner, and Bobko, 1984 ).
Learning vs performance goals
Consistent with the above findings regarding an individual ’s ability are studies by Earley,
Connolly, and Ekegren ( 1989 ) as well as Kanfer and Ackerman ( 1989 ). They found that
when people lack the requisite knowledge to master a task, because they are in the early
stages of learning, urging them to do their best results in higher performance than set-
ting a specifi c difficult goal. The reasons are at least three - fold (Latham, Seijts, and Crim,
2008). First, such tasks are complex for people. Thus the direct goal mechanisms of
effort, persistence, and choice are no longer sufficient to ensure high performance. This
is because people have yet to learn the correct strategy for performing effectively. Second,
such tasks require primarily learning rather than motivation. People have no problem -
solving processes for these tasks to draw upon. Third, people with specific high goals feel
pressure to perform well immediately. As a result, they focus more on their desire to get
c09.indd 169 6/17/09 6:44:06 PM
169 MOTIVATE EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE THROUGH GOAL SETTING
results than on learning the correct way of performing the task. In short, tasks that are
straightforward as well as those that are complex for an individual require attentional
resources, but the resource demands of the latter tasks are greater than those of the
former (Kanfer, 1990 ). Where tasks fall within the problem - solving abilities of people,
as in cases where they have had experience performing the tasks effectively, specifi c dif-
cult performance goals readily lead to the development and execution of task - specifi c
strategies. Truck drivers at Weyerhaeuser found ways to increase truck loads (Latham and
Baldes, 1975 ) and to decrease truck turnaround time (Latham and Saari, 1982 ) after being
assigned a specifi c difficult goal. They drew upon the knowledge they already possessed to
attain the performance goal.
This was not the case in a study by Winters and Latham ( 1996 ) using a new (for them)
complex class scheduling task developed by Earley ( 1985 ). Winters and Latham found a
deleterious effect of a specifi c, difficult goal for performance because the wrong type of
goal was set. When a high learning goal was set in terms of discovering a specifi c number
of ways to solve the task, performance was significantly higher than it was when people
were urged to do their best or had set a performance outcome goal. This is because a
learning goal requires people to focus on understanding the task that is required of them
and developing a plan for performing it correctly. As Oppenheimer noted during the
development of the atomic bomb, determining how to get to one ’s destination is often
more important than the critical target. Research on goal setting theory shows that high
performance is not always the result of high effort or persistence, but rather high cogni-
tive understanding of the task and strategy or plan necessary to complete it (Seijts and
Latham, 2005). A learning goal is especially beneficial for people who score low on cogni-
tive ability (Latham et al., 2008). As John D. Rockefeller said years ago, a goal of good
management is to show average people how to do the work of superior people. A learning
goal can raise the performance of people who score lower on cognitive ability to that of
those who score higher on cognitive intelligence.
Environmental uncertainty
Among the biggest impediments to goal setting is environmental uncertainty (Locke and
Latham, 1990 ). This is because the information required to set learning or outcome goals
may be unavailable. And even when such information is available, it may become obso-
lete due to rapid changes in the environment. Thus as uncertainty increases, it becomes
increasingly diffi cult to set and commit to a long - term goal.
In a simulation of such a situation, Latham and Seijts ( 1999 ) replicated the fi ndings of
Earley, Wojnaroski, and Prest ( 1987 ) and Kanfer and Ackerman ( 1989 ) using a business
game where high school students were paid on a piece - rate basis to make toys, and the
dollar amounts paid for the toys changed continuously without warning. Setting a specifi c
high performance goal resulted in profi ts that were signifi cantly worse than urging the stu-
dents to do their best. But when proximal performance goals were set in addition to the distal
goal, profit was significantly higher than in the other two conditions. This is because in
highly dynamic situations, it is important to actively search for feedback and react quickly
to it (Frese and Zapf, 1994 ). In addition, Dorner ( 1991 ) has found that performance errors
on a dynamic task are often due to deficient decomposition of a goal into proximal goals.
c09.indd 170 6/17/09 6:44:06 PM
170 G ARY P. LATHAM
Proximal goals can increase what Keith and Frese ( 2005 ) call error management. Errors
provide information to employees as to whether their picture of reality is congruent with
goal attainment. There is an increase in informative feedback when proximal or sub - goals
are set relative to setting a distal goal only.
In addition to being informative, the setting of proximal goals can also be motivational
relative to a distal goal that is far into the future. Moreover, the attainment of proximal
goals can increase commitment, through enactive mastery, to attain the distal goal (Seijts
and Latham, 2005 ).
Stretch goals
Don’t expect people to willingly stretch themselves by committing to a very high goal if
the outcome they expect is criticism for making an error. One or more errors are bound to
occur in the active pursuit of a time - sensitive difficult goal. On tasks that are complex for
people, Frese ’ s research (Frese, 2005 ; Keith and Frese, 2005 ) shows that performance actually
increases if errors are encouraged ( the more errors you initially make, the more you learn ” ).
USE THE HIGH PERFORMANCE CYCLE
The usefulness of goal setting theory for everyday applications in work settings is shown in
Figure 9.2 . The high performance cycle (Locke and Latham, 1990 ; Latham et al., 2002 )
or HPC s usefulness for motivating employees in the public sector was demonstrated by
Selden and Brewer ( 2000 ). It is a diagnostic tool or framework for understanding why
employees are or are not motivated. For example:
Moderators
Ability Non-
Commitment contingent
Task complexity rewards
Situational constraints
Demands
Challenge,
difficult goals on
meaningful tasks SatisfactionContingentPerformance
Rewards
in addition to
high self-efficacy
Consequences
Mediators Organizational
Direction of commitment and
attention willingness to
Effort accept future
Persistence challenges
Task strategies
FIGURE 9.2 The high performance cycle
c09.indd 171 6/17/09 6:44:06 PM
171MOTIVATE EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE THROUGH GOAL SETTING
1. Demands
(a) Do people have specifi c high goals?
(b) Are the tasks “ drudgery ” or growth facilitating?
(c) Do people have the confidence so that they can attain the goals set (self - effi cacy)?
2. Moderators
(a) Have people been trained adequately? Do they have the ability to perform the
tasks required of them?
(b) Are they committed to goal attainment?
(c) Do they receive feedback on goal progress?
(d) Do they have the resources to attain the goal or are there situational constraints?
3. Rewards
(a) Are they rewarded for their accomplishments?
(i) Intrinsically?
(ii) Extrinsically?
(b) Are they satisfi ed with their rewards?
4. Attitudes
(a) Are they committed to their organization’s effectiveness?
(b) Are they willing to accept future challenges?
ISSUES IN IMPLEMENTATION
For what should goals be set?
As a theory of motivation, a goal refers to a desired outcome in terms of level of perform-
ance to be attained on a task. Goal content refers to the object or result that is sought after
(Locke and Latham, 1990 ). Thus performance goals should be set for outcomes that are
critical or valued by the individual or the organization in which the person is employed.
An employee may have a career goal, a job goal, a financial goal, as well as psychological
goals including job satisfaction and self - effi cacy. A learning goal should be set for discover-
ing the processes and strategies for reaching a desired outcome when the person lacks the
knowledge to do so. Behavioral goals, identified through a job analysis, are more effective
than a learning goal when the critical behaviors are known (Brown and Latham, 2002). To
set a learning goal in this instance is to encourage paralysis through analysis. Behavioral
goals are especially appropriate for job satisfaction and self - effi cacy.
Because a goal is the object or aim of an action, the completion of a task can be a goal.
As noted by Locke and Latham ( 1990 ), in most goal setting studies the term goal refers to
attaining a specific standard of proficiency on a given task within a specifi c timeframe.
This has resulted in practitioners of goal setting creating the acronym SMART, namely,
goals that are s pecifi c, m easurable, a ttainable, relevant, and have a timeframe (Mealiea and
Latham, 1996 ). The framing of a goal is especially important for implementation with
regard to the stress that it can cause. Frame the goal positively, for example in terms of
something a person can learn to perform well. Don’t frame it negatively, as something a
person may have difficulty attaining. A negatively framed goal ( Try not to miss answering
3 of these 15 anagrams ) leads to worse performance than a positively framed one ( Try
to make words from 12 or more of the 15 anagrams ; Drach - Zahavy and Erez, 2002 ;
Roney, Griggs, and Shanks, 2003) .
c09.indd 172 6/17/09 6:44:07 PM
172 G ARY P. LATHAM
Who should set the goals?
A seminal study at the General Electric Company (Meyer, Kay, and French, 1965 ) revealed
that it is not so important who sets the goal as it is that a specific challenging goal in fact be
set. However, subsequent laboratory and field experiments revealed contradictory fi ndings.
Erez and her colleagues (e.g. Erez, 1986 ; Erez and Arad, 1986; Erez, Earley, and Hulin, 1985 )
found that goal commitment and subsequent performance are higher when employees
participate in the setting of the goal than was the case when the goals were assigned.
A series of 11 studies by Latham and his colleagues (e.g. Latham and Saari, 1979a , b; Latham
and Steele, 1983 ) found that when goal difficulty is held constant, goal commitment and per-
formance are the same regardless of whether the goal is assigned or set participatively.
In what is rare if not unique in science, the two antagonists, Erez and Latham, did
a series of collaborative studies, with Locke as a mediator, to discover the basis for their
confl icting ndings (Latham, Erez, and Locke, 1988 ). They found that their methodol-
ogy was highly similar in the way in which the goals were set participatively, yet highly
different in the way in which the goals were assigned. In what would be expected, based
on Greenberg s organizational justice principles (see Chapter 14 , this volume), when the
assigned goal was given tersely and without any rationale, it had a negative effect on per-
formance relative to participatively set goals. When an assigned goal from an authority
gure included a logic or rationale, it had the same positive effect on goal commitment
and performance as did a participatively set goal. (For an overall summary of the research
on the effects of participation, see Chapter 24 , this volume.)
Subsequent research by Latham, Winters, and Locke ( 1994 ) revealed that Erez had been
correct in arguing the benefi t of participation in goal setting, but for the wrong reason. The
benefit is primarily cognitive rather than motivational. Employee participation in decision
making has a positive effect on performance to the extent that it increases self - effi cacy and
the discovery of task relevant strategies. When this does not occur, when these two variables
are partialed out, participation in decision making has a negligible effect on performance.
Training self - regulation
The management of oneself lies at the core of goal setting theory. Setting a goal and
taking action to attain it is a volitional process. Holding goal difficulty constant, self - set
goals are as effective in increasing performance as are goals that are assigned or set par-
ticipatively (Locke and Latham, 1990 ). This finding is the basis for training people skills in
self - management.
CASE EXAMPLE
The University of Washington
The University of Washington trained their maintenance employees (carpenters, mechanics,
electricians) in self - regulation to increase their job attendance (Frayne and Latham, 1987 ).
The training took place in a group setting one hour a week for eight weeks. In the fi rst ses-
sion, the principles of goal setting were explained to the trainees. In Session 2, the trainees
c09.indd 173 6/17/09 6:44:07 PM
173 MOTIVATE EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE THROUGH GOAL SETTING
generated reasons for their low job attendance. The third session focused on the value of
setting behavioral and outcome (days present) goals for attendance. In the fourth session,
the importance of self - monitoring one ’s behavior was discussed. Specifi cally, the trainees
were taught to use charts and diaries to record (a) their own attendance, (b) the reasons for
missing one or more days of the week, and (c) the steps that were followed to subsequently
return to work. The trainees identified rewards and punishers in the fifth session that they
would self - administer contingent upon their attendance. In the sixth session the trainees
wrote a behavioral contract with themselves. The contract specified writing the goal(s) to
be attained, the timeframe for attaining the goal(s), the outcomes of attaining or failing
to attain the goal(s), and the task strategies necessary for attaining the goal(s). The seventh
session emphasized maintenance. That is, discussion focused on issues that might result in
a relapse in absenteeism, planning for such situations should they occur, and developing
strategies for dealing with such situations. During the final week of training, the trainer
reviewed each technique presented in the program, answered questions from the trainees
regarding these skills, and clarifi ed expectations for self - management.
Observe that the training took explicit account of goal setting moderators and sub-
principles discussed earlier in this chapter. Goal commitment was the focus of Sessions 5
and 6, where rewards and punishers were selected, and a behavioral contract was written.
Feedback through self - monitoring was emphasized in Session 4. The complexity of the task
and the situational constraints were the focus of Session 2 where employees specified in writ-
ing the behavior that they believed would enable them to get to work, and Session 7 where
they outlined possibilities for a relapse and what could be done to overcome such issues.
Participatory group discussions occurred throughout the eight weeks of training. The
main benefit of participation, as noted earlier, is cognitive; thus the training focused the
attention of each person in the group on identifying effective strategies for overcoming
obstacles to attaining the goal. In this way, self - efficacy was increased. Self - effi cacy cor-
related significantly in the study with subsequent job attendance. Three months later
employee attendance was signifi cantly higher in the training than in the control group.
The University of Washington conducted a six - month and a nine - month follow - up
study to determine the long - term effects of this training. Employees who had been trained
in self - management continued to have higher job attendance than those in the control
group. Moreover, when the people in the control group were subsequently given the same
training in self - management, but by a different trainer, they too showed the same positive
improvement in their self - efficacy with regard to coping with obstacles perceived by them
as preventing them from coming to work. Moreover, their job attendance increased to the
same level as that which the original training group had achieved three months after it
had been trained (Latham and Frayne, 1989 ).
When are goals ineffective? The answer to this question is given throughout this chap-
ter. For example, both the American Pulpwood Association and Weyerhaeuser found that
when the goal is abstract such as urging loggers to do their best, productivity is lower than
setting a specifi c difficult goal (Latham and Kinne, 1974; Latham and Yukl, 1975 ). They
also found that when goals are set and supervisory supportiveness is lacking, turnover is
high, people quit (Ronan, Latham, and Kinne, 1973 ). When specifi c challenging perform-
ance goals were set before people have acquired knowledge and skill to perform the task,
the performance of Air Force cadets dropped (Kanfer and Ackerman, 1989 ). In short,
goals do not work when the principles we have discussed are not applied.
c09.indd 174 6/17/09 6:44:07 PM
174 G ARY P. LATHAM
FUTURE DIRECTIONS
A limitation of theories of consciously set goals is that they fail to take advantage of the
subconscious, a storehouse of knowledge, and values beyond that which is found in aware-
ness at any given point in time. This is a limitation because unlike the conscious mind, the
subconscious has an enormous storage capacity. This storage capacity frees the conscious
mind to focus on new facts and make new integrations. Priming may be a method for set-
ting subconscious goals.
People were primed to diet through exposure to a room filled with exercise and dieting
magazines. People in the control group entered a room filled with magazines about poli-
tics and economics. Participants in the primed condition subsequently chose an apple over
a candy bar. They had no awareness of why they made that decision (Fishbach, Friedman,
and Kruglanski, 2003 ). Employees in a call center were given written instructions over a
backdrop photograph of a woman winning a race. They subsequently raised signifi cantly
more dollars than did employees whose instructions were written on an otherwise blank
sheet of paper (Shantz and Latham, 2009 ).
CONCLUSION
Specific challenging goals are motivational regardless of whether they are self - set,
set participatively, or assigned. If the person has the knowledge and skill necessary
to perform the task, performance goals should be set. If the requisite knowledge
or skill is lacking, learning goals should be set. If the moderators and subprinciples
described in this chapter are taken into account by practitioners of goal setting, the
probability that performance and satisfaction will increase is above .90 (Locke and
Latham, 1990 ). No other theory of motivation has been found to be as consistently
effective in the workplace as goal setting.
REFERENCES
Bandura , A. ( 1997 ). Self Efficacy: The Exercise of Control. New York : Freeman .
Bandura , A. ( 2001 ). Social cognitive theory: an agentic perspective. Annual Review of Psychology,
52 , 1–26 .
Brown, T. C., and Latham, G. P. (2002). The effects of behavioral outcome goals, learn-
ing goals, and urging people to do their best on an individual’s teamwork behavior in a
group problem-solving task. Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science, 34, 276–285.
Dorner , D. ( 1991 ). The investigation of action regulation in uncertain and complex
situations . In J. Rasmussen , G. Brehmer, and J. Leplat (eds), Distributed Decision Making:
Cognitive Models for Cooperative Work ( pp. 349 –356 ). New York : Wiley .
Drach - Zahavy , A., and Erez , M. ( 2002 ). Challenge versus threat effects on the goal –
performance relationship. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 88 , 667–682 .
Earley , P. C. ( 1985 ). Influence of information, choice and task complexity upon goal
acceptance, performance, and personal goals. Journal of Applied Psychology, 70 , 481–491 .
Earley , P. C. , and Lee , C. ( 1992 ). Comparative peer evaluations of organizational behav-
ior theories. Organizational Development Journal, 10 , 37–42 .
c09.indd 175 6/17/09 6:44:07 PM
175MOTIVATE EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE THROUGH GOAL SETTING
Earley , P. C. , Connolly , T. , and Ekegren , G. ( 1989 ). Goals, strategy development and task
performance: Some limits to the efficacy of goal setting. Journal of Applied Psychology,
74 , 24–33 .
Earley , P. C. , Wojnaroski , P., and Prest , W. ( 1987 ). Task planning and energy expended:
Exploration of how goals infl uence performance. Journal of Applied Psychology, 72 ,
107–114 .
Erez , M. ( 1977 ). Feedback: a necessary condition for the goal setting – performance
relationship . Journal of Applied Psychology, 62 , 624–627 .
Erez , M. ( 1986 ). The congruence of goal setting strategies with socio - cultural values, and
its effect on performance. Journal of Management, 12 , 83–90 .
Erez , M., and Arad , R. ( 1986 ). Participative goal setting: Social, motivational, and cogni-
tive factors. Journal of Applied Psychology, 71 , 591–597 .
Erez , M., Earley , P. C. , and Hulin , C. L. ( 1985 ). The impact of participation on goal accept-
ance and performance: A two - step model. Academy of Management Journal, 28 , 50–66 .
Fishbach , A., Friedman , R. S. , and Kruglanski , A. W. ( 2003 ). Leading us not unto temp-
tation: Momentary allurements elicit overriding goal activation. Journal of Personality and
Social Psychology, 84 , 296–309 .
Frayne , C. A. , and Latham , G. P. ( 1987 ). The application of social learning theory to
employee self - management of attendance. Journal of Applied Psychology, 72 , 387–392 .
Frese , M. ( 2005 ). Grand theories and midrange theories: Cultural effects on theorizing and
the attempt to understand active approaches to work. In K. G. Smith and M. Hitt (eds),
The Oxford Handbook of Management Theory: The Process of Theory Development. Oxford, UK :
Oxford University Press.
Frese , M., and Zapf , D. ( 1994 ). Action as the core of work psychology: a German approach.
In H. C. Triandis , M. D. Dunnette , and L. M. Hough (eds), Handbook of Industrial and
Organizational Psychology : Vol. 4 (pp. 271–340 ). Palo Alto, CA : Consulting Psychologist
Press. (Second edition.)
Gauggel , S. ( 1999 ). Goal - setting and its influence on the performance of brain - damaged
patients. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Philipps University of Marburg, Germany.
Kanfer , R. ( 1990 ). Motivation theory and industrial and organizational theory . In
M. D. Dunnette and L. M. Hough (eds), Handbook of Industrial and Organizational
Psychology (pp. 75 –170 ). Palo Alto, CA : Consulting Psychologists Press .
Kanfer , R., and Ackerman , P. L. ( 1989 ). Motivation and cognitive abilities: An integrative/
aptitude - treatment interaction approach to skill acquisition. Journal of Applied Psychology,
74 , 657–690 .
Keith , N. , and Frese , M. ( 2005 ). Self - regulation error management training: Emotion con-
trol and metacognition as mediators of performance effects. Journal of Applied Psychology,
90 , 677–691 .
Kernan , M. C. , and Lord , R. G. ( 1988 ). Effects of participative versus assigned goals and
feedback in a multitrial task. Motivation and Emotion, 12 , 75–86 .
Lashley , K. S. ( 1929 ). Brain Mechanisms and Intelligence. Chicago : University of Chicago Press .
Latham , G. P. ( 2001 ). The importance of understanding and changing employee outcome
expectancies for gaining commitment to an organizational goal. Personnel Psychology, 54 ,
707–716 .
Latham , G. P. , and Baldes, J. J. ( 1975 ). The “ practical significance ” of Locke ’ s theory of
goal setting. Journal of Applied Psychology, 60 , 122–124 .
c09.indd 176 6/17/09 6:44:07 PM
176 G ARY P. LATHAM
Latham , G. P. , and Brown , T. C. ( 2006 ). The effect of learning vs. outcome goals on self - effi cacy
and satisfaction in a MBA Program . Applied Psychology: An International Review, 55 , 606–623 .
Latham, G. P., and Budworth, M. (2006). The effect of training in verbal self-guidance on
the self-efficacy and performance of Native North Americans in the selection interview.
Journal of Vocational Behavior, 68, 516–523.
Latham, G. P., and Frayne , C. ( 1989 ). Self - management training for increasing job attend-
ance: A follow - up and a replication. Journal of Applied Psychology, 74 , 411–416 .
Latham, G. P., and Kinne, S. B. (1974). Improving Job Performance through Training in
Goal Setting. Journal of Applied Psychology, 59, 187–191.
Latham , G. P. , and Locke , E. A. ( 1975 ). Increasing productivity with decreasing time limits:
A fi eld replication of Parkinson’s law. Journal of Applied Psychology, 60 , 524–526 .
Latham , G. P. , and Locke, E. A. ( 1991 ). Self regulation through goal setting . Organizational
Behavior and Human Decision Process, 50 , 212–247 .
Latham , G. P. , and Locke, E. A. ( 2007 ). New developments in and directions for goal set-
ting . European Psychologist, 12 , 290–300 .
Latham , G. P. , and Saari , L. M. ( 1979a ). The effects of holding goal difficulty constant on
assigned and participatively set goals. Academy of Management Journal, 22 , 163–168 .
Latham , G. P. , and Saari , L. M. ( 1979b ). The importance of supportive relationships in
goal setting. Journal of Applied Psychology, 64 , 151–156 .
Latham , G. P. , and Saari , L. M. ( 1982 ). The importance of union acceptance for produc-
tivity improvement through goal setting. Personnel Psychology, 35 , 781–787 .
Latham , G. P. , and Seijts , G. H. ( 1999 ). The effects of proximal and distal goals on per-
formance on a moderately complex task. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 20 , 421–429 .
Latham , G. P. , and Steele , T. P. ( 1983 ). The motivational effects of participation versus
goal setting on performance. Academy of Management Journal, 26 , 406–417 .
Latham , G. P. , and Yukl , G. A. ( 1975 ). Assigned versus participative goal setting with edu-
cated and uneducated wood workers. Journal of Applied Psychology, 60 , 299–302 .
Latham , G. P., Erez , M., and Locke, E. A. ( 1988 ). Resolving scientific disputes by the joint
design of crucial experiments by the antagonists: Application to the Erez Latham dis-
pute regarding participation in goal setting. Journal of Applied Psychology, 73 , 753–772 .
Latham , G. P., Locke , E. A. , and Fassina , N. E. ( 2002 ). The high performance cycle: Standing
the test of time. In S. Sonnentag (ed.), The Psychological Management of Individual Performance:
A Handbook in the Psychology of Management in Organizations (pp. 201–228 ). Chichester : Wiley .
Latham , G. P., Mitchell , T. R. , and Dossett , D. L. ( 1978 ). The importance of participative
goal setting and anticipated rewards on goal difficulty and job performance. Jour nal of
Applied Psychology, 63 , 170–171 .
Latham , G. P., Seijts , H., and Crim , D. (2008). The effects of learning goal diffi culty level
and cognitive ability on strategies and performance. Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science,
40, 220–229.
Latham , G. P., Winters , D. C. , and Locke, E. A. ( 1994 ). Cognitive and motivational effects
of participation: a mediator study. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 15 , 49–63 .
Locke, E. A. , and Latham , G. P. ( 1990 ). A Theory of Goal Setting and Task Performance.
Englewood Cliffs, NJ : Prentice Hall .
Locke, E. A. , and Latham , G. P. ( 2002 ). Building a practically useful theory of goal setting
and task motivation: A 35 - year odyssey. American Psychologist, 57 , 705–717 .
c09.indd 177 6/17/09 6:44:08 PM
177MOTIVATE EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE THROUGH GOAL SETTING
Locke, E. A., Frederick , E., Buckner , E. , and Bobko , P. ( 1984 ). Effect of previously assigned
goals on self - set goals and performance. Journal of Applied Psychology, 69 , 694–699 .
Mealiea , L. W. , and Latham , G. P. ( 1996 ). Skills for Managerial Success: Theory, Experience, and
Practice. Toronto, ON : Irwin .
Meyer , H. H. , Kay , E., and French , J. R. P., Jr. ( 1965 ). Split roles in performance appraisal.
Harvard Business Review, 43 , 123–129 .
Millman , Z., and Latham , G. P. ( 2001 ). Increasing re- employment through training in ver-
bal self guidance. In M. Erez , U. Kleinbeck, and H. K. Thierry (eds), Work Motivation in
the Context of a Globalizing Economy. Lawrence Erlbaum .
Miner, J. B. ( 1984 ). The validity and usefulness of theories in an emerging organizational
science . Academy of Management Review, 9 , 296–306 .
Mitchell , T. R. , and Daniels, D. ( 2003 ). Motivation . In W. C. Borman , D. R. Ilgen, and
R. J. Klimoski (eds), Handbook of Psychology: Industrial Organizational Psychology, Vol. 12
(pp. 225 –254 ). New York : Wiley .
Pinder, C. C. ( 2008 ). Work Motivation in Organizational Behavior ( 2nd edition ). Toronto, ON :
Psychology Press .
Prigatano, G. P., Wong , J. L. , Williams , C., and Plenge , K. L. ( 1997 ). Prescribed versus
actual length of stay and impatient neurorehabilitation outcome for brain dysfunc-
tional patients. Archives of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, 78 , 621–629 .
Rodgers , R., and Hunter, J. E. ( 1991 ). Impact of management by objectives on organiz-
ational productivity. Journal of Applied Psychology, 76 , 322–336 .
Ronan , W. W., Latham , G. P. , and Kinne, S. B. ( 1973 ). The effects of goal setting and
supervision on worker behavior in an industrial situation. Journal of Applied Psychology,
58 , 302–307 .
Roney, C. J. R., Griggs, M., and Shanks, B. (2003). The mediation and moderation of
general motivational variables by specific goals that are negatively framed. Unpublished
manuscript.
Salancik , G. ( 1977 ). Commitment and the control of organizational behavior and belief .
In B. M. Staw and G. R. Salancik (eds), New Directions in Organizational Behavior. Chicago :
St. Clair Press .
Seijts, G. H. , and Latham , G. P. ( 2005 ). Learning versus performance goals: When should
each be used? Academy of Management Executive, 19 , 124–131 .
Selden , S. C. , and Brewer , G. A. ( 2000 ). Work motivation in the senior executive service:
Testing the high performance cycle theory. Journal of Public Administration Research and
Theory, 10 , 531–550 .
Shantz , A., and Latham , G. P. ( 2009 ). The effect of subconscious and conscious
goals on employee performance. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes,
109, 9–17.
Weinberg , R. S. ( 1994 ). Goal setting and performance in sport and exercise settings: A
synthesis and critique. Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise, 26 , 469–477 .
Wiese , B. S. , and Freund , A. M. ( 2005 ). Goal progress makes one happy, or does it?
longitudinal ndings from the work domain . Journal of Occupational and Organizational
Psychology, 78 , 287–304 .
Winters , D. , and Latham , G. P. ( 1996 ). The effect of learning versus outcome goals on a
simple versus a complex task . Group and Organization Management, 21 , 236–250 .
c09.indd 178 6/17/09 6:44:08 PM
178 G ARY P. LATHAM
EXERCISES
Group exercise goal setting
Randomly divide people into three groups. Tell one group (in writing in all cases), so no
person will know the others goals, to think of 14 ways to improve their business (UG
or MBA) program or their business unit ’s effectiveness in two minutes. (Give all subjects
actually three minutes to show the effects of persistence of the hard goal: the hard goal
group will still be working.) Give a second group the goal of 4 and tell the third group to
do their best. Calculate the mean score of each group at the end. (It is best to use lined
sheets numbered 1 to 14 or 1 to 4) for the goal groups and a blank sheet for the do best
group. (This helps prevent people from setting their own personal goals.)
Group exercise – subconscious priming
Give one group a photo of a woman winning a race and give the other group a blank sheet
of paper. Ask both groups to come up with as many uses for a coat hanger as they can in
two minutes. Count the scores of the two groups. This exercise is designed to measure the
effects of subconscious priming.
... 2.2 Subjective firm performance AC plays a key role in predicting organizational outcomes (Anwar ul Haq et al., 2018) and entrepreneurial competencies (Bloemen-Bekx et al., 2019). High performance is achieved through years of engagement, and engagement is obtained through passion and motivation, which are both elements of AC, which could imply a high level of SE (St-Cyr et al., 2021;Latham, 2017) indicated that motivation is the main reason certain people perform better Affective commitment than their peers, and people with less self-efficacy easily disengage from their duties. Thus, we propose H6.1. ...
Article
Purpose This study aims to address the effects of self-esteem and affective commitment on firm performance and whether these effects vary according to the gender and age of active entrepreneurial students. Design/methodology/approach This study uses a subsample from the Global University Entrepreneurial Spirit Students’ Survey (GUESSS) of entrepreneur students running their own businesses to perform a structural equation model (SEM) analysis to test the relationship between self-esteem (SE), affective commitment (AC) and firm performance (FP) moderated by the gender and age of entrepreneur students. Findings The results confirm that higher levels of entrepreneur SE are related to a higher assessment of AC and FP. A major effect of SE on AC was also observed among male respondents. Age was not related to an increase in AC. The effect of SE on AC and FP was lower among older students. Originality/value This study makes valuable contributions to the fields of entrepreneurship, psychology, gender and organizational behavior. This study presents empirical support for the theoretical framework using SEM, presenting initial insights into the mechanisms that shape AC in entrepreneurial students and its implications for FP.
... Ambitious organizational goals may even become more motivating for employees to achieve. In addition, (Latham, 2017) discovered that such commitment can also result in a rise of employee emotional engagement. ...
Article
Full-text available
The implementation of performance appraisal is widespread, and it is a significant tool by which organizations can maximize the potential of human resources. The purpose of this study is to investigate how performance appraisal affect employee's job satisfaction and organizational behavior. The methodology used for this research is a qualitative-library research, entailing the data collections and analyses from published resources such as books, journals, and internet databases. Based on the results, it was found that the experience of a positive performance appraisal raises not only workers' sense of accomplishment but also self-worth and fosters the trust in the legitimacy process. Furthermore, appraisal assists employee retention by highlighting the company's dedication to address their requirements and support the development. In order to increase job satisfaction and organizational behavior, the study emphasizes the values of giving feedback to employees, defining goals, encouraging employee involvement, and carrying out efficient performance appraisal.
... The goal setting theory provides an opportunity to the Church to understand that some of its projects will perform better because of the difference in project goals and it provides the linkage between project implementers in the different Archdioceses and top management at Namirembe Diocesan Offices through the documented lessons learned which is feedback on the project assumptions and strategies hence aiding decision making. The theory therefore reduces uncoordinated activity in the organization (Ahamed et al., 2017, as cited in Seezi et al., 2021. Further still, this goal setting theory promises high performance in the different projects that are developed to improve the socioeconomic status of the Church of Uganda as backed up by Lunenburg, 2011 "Goals are more effective when they are used to evaluate performance, When employees know that their performance will be evaluated in terms of how well they attained their goals, the impact of goals increases". ...
Article
Full-text available
Purpose: It was prudent that the Church of Uganda strategic plan 2025 was incorporated with a monitoring strategy intended to progressively track program performance and analyze activity implementation and foresee any difficulties so as to take timely corrective action. This paper examined the relationship between monitoring and performance of Church of Uganda Projects in Namirembe Diocese. Methodology: A Cross sectional survey design was used on a study population of 117 respondents. 87 respondents filled the Survey questionnaires whose responses were analysed by using correlational and regression analysis by using PSPP software Version 1.2.0-g0fb4db. Key Informant interviews and an FGD were carried out and responses were analysed using content analysis and results presented as text. Findings: Descriptive findings highlighted that monitoring to some extent improves project performance (mean 3.12), This was further supported by the qualitative findings. Furthermore, inferential statistics confirmed that Monitoring had a significant positive relationship with Project performance (β=0.25, p= 0.014<0.05). Unique contribution to theory, practice and policy: In conclusion, this paper established that monitoring influences project performance. The weaknesses included; Diversion of funds from the intended projects, No assigned personels to directly monitor projects, Lack of monitoring skills and knowledge, Lack of transparency in the reports, inadequate salaries of the monitoring staff, conflict of interest in the businesses that are run on Church land. Therefore, to improve upon the performance of Church of Uganda projects, it is important to strengthen the monitoring mechanisms; financial monitoring, process monitoring and outcome monitoring. The non-existent monitoring framework will be developed with informed decisions from the study.
... Dweck (1999) established that individuals' goal orientations by encouraging them to seek out the opportunities for learning, information sharing, and innovation. In parallel fashion, Latham and Locke (2017) asserted that goal setting is most effective when the objectives initiated by leaders and performance effectiveness are linked. Therefore, it is proposed that: ...
Article
Purpose The present study investigates the predicting role of institutional leadership competencies (namely, achieving goals and outcomes, leadership and leading change, and integrity and justice) in influencing job performance. It also seeks to examine whether proactive personality moderates the purported relationship. Design/methodology/approach Data were collected from 103 institutional leaders in various higher education institutions in Malaysia. Partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) technique via Smart PLS 2.0 was used to analyze the data and test the hypotheses. Findings The findings indicate that competencies of leadership and leading change and integrity and justice significantly and positively influenced job performance. Proactive personality was found to significantly moderate the relationship between leadership and leading change dimension and job performance. Research limitations/implications This study contributes to the literature by assessing leadership competencies as the predictors of job performance. The moderating role of proactive personality is also substantiated in the leadership and leading change dimension and job performance linkage. Practical implications The significant and positive impact of leadership and leading change as well as integrity and justice on job performance suggests the importance of these leadership competencies in promoting high level of job performance among institutional leaders. Furthermore, in ensuring high job performance among institutional leaders, proactive personality is a crucial attribute that is worth to be given attention by higher education institution (HEI) administrators. Originality/value This study aims to provide additional empirical evidence in the leadership competencies domain. The research framework of this study managed to substantiate empirical evidence in partial support on the importance of leadership competencies and proactive personality in predicting job performance.
Article
Full-text available
Contrary to the extant thinking on motivation in the workplace, we argue that performance or outcome goals can have a deleterious effect on one's performance. We demonstrate that in situations where primarily the acquisition of knowledge and skills rather than an increase in effort and persistence is required, a specific challenging learning rather than an outcome goal should be set. A learning goal draws attention away from the end result. The focus instead is on the discovery of effective strategies or processes to attain desired results. The practical implications of learning goals for leadership, performance appraisal, and professional development are explained.
Chapter
IntroductionThe High Performance CycleDemands Influence PerformanceMediatorsModeratorsPerformance Leads to Organization CommitmentSatisfaction Leads to Organization CommitmentDiscussionAcknowledgementReferences
Conference Paper
The effect of a proximal plus a distal goal was investigated relative to setting only a distal goal or urging participants to do their best. Young adults (N = 39) were paid on a piece rate basis to make toys. An analysis of variance revealed that the amount of money earned by the participants who were urged to 'do your best' was significantly greater than the amount of money earned by the participants who were assigned a distal goal. However, the amount of money earned by the participants who were assigned proximal goals, in addition to a distal goal, was significantly greater than the amount of money earned by the participants in the 'do your best' condition. The correlation between perceived self-efficacy and the amount of money earned was 0.45 (p < 0.01). Perceived self-efficacy significantly increased only for those participants in the proximal plus distal goal condition. Proximal goals, through self-efficacy and performance feedback, appear to have focused attention on task appropriate strategies. The results suggest an informational explanation of proximal goals as opposed to a motivational one through goal commitment. Implications of these findings for mentoring and training are discussed. Copyright (C) 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Article
In management circles, performance appraisal is a highly interesting and provocative topic. And in business literature, too, knowledgeable people write emphatically, pro and con, on the performance appraisal question (Kindall and Gatza, 1963; Mayfield, 1960; McGregor, 1957). In fact, one might almost say that everybody talks and writes about it, but nobody has done any real scientific testing of it.
Article
Training in self-management was given to 20 unionized state government employees to increase their attendance at the work site. Analyses of variance revealed that compared to a control condition (n = 20), training in self-regulatory skills taught employees how to manage personal and social obstacles to job attendance, and it raised their perceived self-efficacy that they could exercise influence over their behavior. Consequently, employee attendance was significantly higher in the training than in the control group. The higher the perceived self-efficacy, the better the subsequent job attendance. These data were significant at the .05 level.
Article
Some scholars believe that more effort should be devoted to the development of a comprehensive theory of work motivation. Several candidate theories have been advanced in recent years, but they are radically different and empirical testing is almost nonexistent. This article reports the first known effort to test one of these metatheories - the high performance cycle proposed by Edwin A. Locke and Gary P. Latham. Specifically, we assess the empirical adequacy of the high performance cycle among senior federal executives, using attitudinal data from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management's 1991-1992 Survey of Federal Government Employees. The overall fit of the LISREL 8 model is good, and there is strong empirical support for the key hypothesized relationships. The article concludes with a discussion of the implications and limitations of this research.