Purpose, Performance,

Feedback and the Exam

People strategy in context
Michael Pedersen
2021
Purpose
1. Envision an purpose-driven
organization
2. Discover the purpose
3. Recognize the need for
authenticity
4. Turn the authentic message into a constant
message
5. Stimulate individual (and collective)
learning
6. Turn midlevel
managers into
purpose-driven leaders
7. Connect the people to the purpose
8. Unleash the positive
energizers
Can you locate these steps in OB and
Buurtzorg
The ‘Black Box’ of
HRM– chapter seven
Michael Pedersen, CBS
What could be interesting for our paper
Chapter takeaways

1. There are complex and fragile links between intentions in HRM and performance outcomes
(this is the ‘black box’ problem)
2. Developed at the individual level of analysis, the AMO model argues that performance is a
function of ability, motivation, and the opportunity to perform in a particular context, implying
that the role of any HRM process is to influence these mediating variables
3. To understand the ‘black box’, we must recognise that HRM is a social process in organisations,
involving a range of actors who play a variety of roles.
Senior managers make their impact, as do line managers, who are critical to the implementation of
complex HR practices and the character of daily working relationships and finally employees are active
agents who help to shape HRM and performance
 Figure 7.1 The AMO model of performance

Individual factors
 
- Experience
- Intelligence
- Health
- Personality, etc Individual:
 Ability Individual
 Motivation performance
 Opportunity to outcomes
Situational factors perform
 
- HR policies and
practices oriented to
creating ‘AMO’
 
- Related variables
in the production
system and the
organisational
context
The AMO model of performance

Opening ‘the black box’ of HRM

The AMO model, is one popular starting-point in attempts to explain how HRM affects
performance. The model argues that individuals perform when they have:
• the ability (A) to perform (they can do the job because they possess the necessary
knowledge, skills and aptitudes);
• the motivation (M) to perform (they will do the job because they want to do it or feel that
they must do it); and
• the opportunity (O) to perform (their work structure and its environment provides the
necessary support and avenues for expression)
 Figure 7.1 The AMO model of performance

Individual factors
 
- Experience For instance what motivates this singular
- Intelligence individual in Buurtzorg or OB
- Health
- Personality, etc

Situational factors
  For instance different HR models (craft-model,
- HR policies and scripted model, high involvement model,
practices oriented to professional model etc)
creating ‘AMO’
 
- Related variables in
the production system
For instance it-systems like in Buurtzorg or social
and the organisational
context like degree of team based work and
context
hands on management
The AMO model of performance…
HRM academics has especially looked at
particular ways into the AOM.

Some look to the M part in this framework to

argue that when employees perform well for an
organisation when the organizations performs
well for them

Others look to the A part to investment in training

can lead to better work effort and dedication.

And some has look to reshaping the O factor such

as giving employees more control over their job
might utilise more skills (A) and can be more
intrinsically motivation (M)
Analysing the management process in HRM

To understand the ‘black box’ of HRM, we must recognise that it

is a social process. It involves a range of actors with a variety of
roles, who interact in complex ways

Senior
Active employees
Management
Daily
Line experiences
Management
Senior management: Creating the ‘internal fit’ so that HR practices is
mutual supportive

• Coherence among HR
practices and consistency
e.g. not having practices
that offer strong training
in psychological safety in
teams but a reward system
that is very individualistic.
Senior management: Consistency in HR practices

• ‘Complementary fit’ e.g. investment

in recruitment also means investment
in training and promotion
• ‘Among employee consistency e.g.
people doing the same kind of work
get the same employement condition
(such as standard working time and
leave policies)
• ‘Temporal consistency’ e.g. upholding
the ‘psychological contract’ and
change how you treat people on a
daily basis
 Senior management: Strategic Tensions

However, management might

some time invest in High
Involvement HR and at the same
time intensify work because of
change in production systems
(or as we will see in the
Thompson text because of
investment from capital funds)
 Senior management

• In general, there is always the possibility

for gaps between rhetoric and reality in
HRM (Legge 2005) and four types from
Grant (1999)

• Congruent contract where management

rhetoric appeal to employees and
coincides with their perception of reality
• Mismatched contract where rhetoric's fail
because it has no appeal to the employee
• Partial contract where parts of the rhetoric
appeal to the employees and other not
(for instance that personal development is
important but the pay doesn’t match the
development)
• Trial contract where the rhetoric is given a
chance to prove itself and become reality
Line Management

Some HR policies are directly transmitted into

practice without slippage but much else is
filtered through line managers, positively or
negatively

This is particularly true in the case of complex

practices, such as performance appraisal,
which are very sensitive to how they are
implemented

If the quality of HRM is to improve, senior

managers need to manage their line managers
effectively: listening to their issues, and
motivating and enabling them to perform as
managers of people
Daily experiences

Employees, then, are

influenced not simply by
top management values
and formal policies but
by the reality of what
they perceive and
experience on a daily
For
When
eachemployees
employee,form
therea is
relatively
a ‘psychological
common basis
climate’
perception
in theof
workplace:
management’s
their own,
intentions
individual
and
sense
actions,
of what
we canis happening
also talk meaningfully
in their employment
of a ‘social’
relationship
or ‘organisational’
and how it climate
affectsintheir
the workplace
well-being
Active employees

Workers are active agents

in shaping the employment
relationship, both
individually and collectively
(e.g. labour process theory
and jobcrafting theory)
 Workforce responses,
Management outcomes and strategies
intentions  
  Types and levels of human
Senior management’s capital
Management actions Workforce
articulated values and  
  performance
espoused employee Collective perceptions of
Direct actions of senior outcomes
relations style workplace climate
managers (e.g. actual  
   
budget allocations) Productivity and
HR policies aiming to Workforce levels of trust,
  quality levels
build workforce engagement, commitment,
Direct actions of HR  
capabilities, fatigue and stress
specialists (e.g. stance in Quality of
motivations and  
wage negotiations) financial
opportunities to Quality of coordination
  performance
perform  
Line manager  
  Strategies of cooperation
enactments of HR Types of
Goals and investments and resistance
practices and personal innovation
in marketing, strategies  
operations, and  
finance

Figure 7.2 An expanded model of the ‘black box’ of HRM

Boxall and Purcell (2016) Strategy and Human Resource Management. 4th Edition. Palgrave
What could be interesting for our paper
Process
• Discuss in your group

• Find another group

• Explain your interest

Feedback-seeking
Why feedback?
• Many workers today find
themselves in a feedback vacuum.
For example, in knowledge-based
organizations (Drucker, 1993),
peers and managers may not be
able to evaluate the work of
experts. Thus, knowledge workers
interested in feedback must
devise creative ways and sources
to ascertain whether they are on
the right track.
Why feedback?
• Also, many workers are
temporally and physically
separated from their co-workers
and supervisors. Whether working
virtually at home or across an
ocean in a subsidiary, they may
not be able to seek feedback
information, through indirect
means such as monitoring, even if
they wanted to.
Why feedback?
• Moreover, an increasingly
diverse and multicultural
workforce may mean that
workers cannot as easily
anticipate others’ feedback
and do not know how
others view them unless
they seek that feedback
directly
What is the purpose of feedback?

Instrumental Ego-Defense

Image-
Defense
Instrumental
• A way of reducing insecurities individuals might
experience in task execution for instance in a
VUCA world
• So individuals will seek instrumental feedback if
their are unsure about the task
 Instrumental

• This instrumental perspective is very pragmatic and about

attaining information
• New employees will often have a instrumental perspective due to
many insecurities in a new work environment
Ego-Defense

• The preference for feedback is

confirmation of a certain self-perception or
feeling of self-worth.
• This means looking for situations with
positive feedback and avoiding situations
with negative feedback
Ego-Defense

• While negative feedback in the instrumental view can

help boost performance the Ego-Defense view consider
such feedback problematic
• However, people with a high level of self-worth will be
more willing to have negative feedback in the Ego-
Defense view.
 • People care about what other
Image-defense people think thus feedback can
also have a image defensive
purpose.

• Looking good in the eyes of

others can be a good driver
Image-defense

• However, the image defensive purpose might

dominate the instrumental aspects of
feedback.
• In such situations feedback that might help the
individual grow and learn might be avoided as
it might hurt the individual’s image
These different purposes with feedback can
become problematic for the organization

• For instance research points to that people that are very image-
defensive will seek feedback far less than people with are primarily
instrumental
• However, image-defensive can also be proactive for instance when
individuals seek feedback from their managers in front of colleagues
(most often when the employee expect positive feedback).
Purpose of feedback Contributes to Centrale elements

Instrumental Reducing insecurities in work Work-task, insecurity, costs

execution like time and quality

Ego-defense Defense mechanism that Individual, self-worth, self-

secures that feedback perception, costs like
converges with the declining feelings of self-
individuals self-perception worth

Image-defense Strategy used by the Others, self-promotion, social

individual to secure others costs
perceive her in a certain way
How is feedback organized in OB and Buurtzorg and
what can OB and Buurtzorg learn from this model
Exam – some additional points
The structure of the paper
• The most important thing is that the paper respond to the learning
objectives
That means you can write it a more classic sense

1. Introduction
2. Problem – research question
3. Theory (YOU DONT NEED A METHOD SECTION)
4. Analysis
5. Discussion (for instance implications for further research and/or
practice)
6. Conclusion
7. Points for the oral exam
Or do a more essayistic style
• Here you can for instance introduce theory as you need it
Or a mixture between the two
Oral exam in groups
• 2 persons: 10 min presentation

• 3-5 person : 15 min presentation

Tips
• What story do you want to tell (remember we read
the paper)

• What are your 3-5 points.

• Start of by telling them in one-liners. So the

examiner have an idea of what you want to cover

• Remember to be clear about when you are moving

from one to the other
Tips
• Consider having a ‘map’ or model that can illustrate your points

• DON’T USE POWERPOINTS instead print out something

Preparing for the exam
• Have text experts in your group –
responsible for telling the rest of the
group how a certain text might relate
to your paper

• Go through each section of you paper

in the group and ask yourselves why is
this important for answering the
research question
Preparing for the exam

• Prepare a map or model for

you oral exam

• Talk about how you will make

room for one another during
the exam
• If one of you gets very nervous
how can your team support
you in the room
Q&A