Self‐Assessment versus Self‐Improvement Motives: How Does Social Reference Group Selection Influence Organizational Responses to Performance Feedback?
| Published date | 01 October 2023 |
| Author | Daniela Blettner,Serhan Kotiloglu,Thomas G. Lechler |
| Date | 01 October 2023 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8551.12700 |
British Journal of Management, Vol. 34, 2312–2333 (2023)
DOI: 10.1111/1467-8551.12700
Self-Assessment versus Self-Improvement
Motives: How Does Social Reference Group
Selection Inuence Organizational
Responses to Performance Feedback?
Daniela Blettner,1Serhan Kotiloglu 2and Thomas G. Lechler3
1Beedie School of Business, Simon Fraser University, 8888 University Drive, Burnaby, BC, V5A 1S6, Canada,
2College of Business Administration, California State University San Marcos, 333 S Twin Oaks Valley Rd, San
Marcos, CA, 92096, USA, and 3School of Business, Stevens Institute of Technology, CastlePoint on Hudson,
Hoboken, NJ, 07030, USA
Corresponding author email: skotiloglu@csusm.edu
The performance feedback theory (PFT) proposes that organizations compare their per-
formance to other organizations (i.e. their social reference group) and initiate responses
based on this comparison. While social comparison represents a core element of the PFT,
it is not well understood how organizations select social reference groups and how this
selection may affect organizational responses (e.g. risk-taking, change, innovation). We
propose that the motives that organizations use to select their social reference groups
impact their responses to performance feedback. Our meta-analysis of 99 empirical
PFT studies focuses on two motives underlying the selection of social reference groups
for performance feedback: self-assessment and self-improvement. While self-assessment
through comparison requiresthe selection of a relevant set of referent organizations, self-
improvementrelies on the selection of the highest performing referent organizations. Our
results show that organizational responses to performance feedback differ depending on
which motive-based reference group is selected for comparison. These differences are
more evident when performance is above aspirations. This nding has important impli-
cations for PFT researchers to predict organizational responses moreprecisely.
Introduction
Toevaluate their performance, organizations com-
pare their performance with other organizations
(i.e. social reference groups) and, in response, they
make organizational decisions (e.g. change, risk-
taking, innovation) (Greve, 2003b).1They may
form social aspirations based on different types
of social reference groups: their direct rivals, com-
petitors pursuing the same strategy, or the top
1While we focus only on social comparison in this paper,
rms may also compare their performance to their own
past performance (i.e. historical comparison).
performers in their industry to evaluate their own
performance. Researchers (e.g. Kacperczyk, Beck-
man and Moliterno, 2015; Labianca et al., 2009;
Moliterno et al., 2015; Smith and Chae, 2017) in
the tradition of the performance feedback the-
ory (PFT) (Greve, 2003b) have related certain so-
cial reference groups to specic organizational re-
sponses. Since these important studies are context-
bound, the cumulative effect of social reference
groups in the PFT is unknown. Researchers do not
understand why organizations select certain ref-
erence groups and how these groups are related
to their responses, leaving social reference groups
within the PFT ‘undertheorized’ (Moliterno et al.,
2015: 1684).
© 2023 British Academy of Management.
Self-Assessment versus Self-Improvement Motives 2313
The PFT builds on self-assessment, which is
a specic self-evaluation motive, suggesting that
organizations want to accurately assess their sta-
tus quo relative to their competitors (Sedikides
and Strube, 1997), and they select social refer-
ence groups accordingly. However, prior PFT re-
search has not sufciently considered other self-
evaluationmotives (Audia, Brion and Greve, 2015)
and whether organizations respond differently
to performance evaluations with social reference
groups that are selected based on other motives.
Another primary motive of the self -evaluation
theory (Sedikides and Strube, 1997) is self-
improvement, the human tendency for upward
striving (Festinger, 1954), which is essential to ex-
plaining competitive rm behaviour(Porter, 1996).
Unlike the diagnostic self-assessment motive, the
self-improvement motive is ambitious. Without
the consideration of the self -improvement mo-
tive, the PFT cannot explain continuous learning
behaviours of rms to generate most economic
value.
The purpose of this paper is to integrate the
self-improvement motive into the PFT and anal-
yse its differential impact on the performance
feedback process. We chose a meta-analytic ap-
proach to produce generalizable insights – be-
yond the idiosyncratic limitations of a particu-
lar empirical context – on the inuences of social
reference groups. We quantitatively compare and
contrast the impacts of self -assessment and self-
improvement motives across the 99 empirical PFT
studies that include social reference groups. We
theorize and test how the self-improvement motive
leads to predictions that deviate from the PFT.
We expandthe reach and impact of the PFT lit-
erature by integratingcompetitive striving through
the inclusion of the self -improvement motive. We
theorize about social reference groups within the
PFT literature by demonstrating differential ef-
fects of motive-based reference groups on organi-
zational responses. We propose an integrated con-
ceptual model that links four self-evaluation mo-
tives for reference group selection to explain dif-
ferent motive-based organizationalresponses. Our
generalizable, meta-analytic results demonstrate
that differentiating between the self-improvement
and self-assessment motives will improve the pre-
dictive quality of the PFT by developing a novel
theoretical perspective for responses to perfor-
mance above aspiration (Kotiloglu, Chen and
Lechler, 2021).
Theory and hypotheses
Self-assessment in performance feedback theory
In the behavioural theory of the rm that the
PFT originates from, Cyert and March pro-
pose that rms evaluate their performance based
on ‘other comparable organizations’ (Cyert and
March, 1992: 172).2These comparisons are based
on different self-evaluation motives an organi-
zation is initiating that are following the self-
evaluation theory (Festinger, 1954; Sedikides and
Strube, 1997). The selection of comparable organi-
zations satises the self-assessment motive, an im-
portant self-evaluation motive (Audia, Brion and
Greve,2015; Sedikides and Strube, 1997). The self -
assessment motive suggests that organizations are
motivated to assess their performance by looking
for diagnostic information about their organiza-
tion’sperformance (Audia, Brion and Greve,2015;
Beckman and Lee, 2017; Greve, 2003b). To sup-
port an accurate evaluation of performance (Cy-
ert and March, 1992; Festinger, 1954), social ref-
erence groups used for self-assessment (from here
on: self-assessment groups) are similar to the focal
organization, since knowledge gained from com-
parisons with similar rms is to some extent also
applicable to the focal rm and, for that reason,
easily transferable knowledge. The conditions un-
der which similar companies compete and attain
performance are comparableand, thus, they enable
meaningful and informativecomparison and effec-
tive learning from others.
All rms in the self-assessment group are com-
parable to the focal rm (and to each other) with
respect to at least one important attribute (e.g.
rm type, location, size, product offerings). One
type of social reference group that supports self-
assessment particularly well are strategic groups
(Fiegenbaum and Thomas, 1995; Hodgkinson,
1997; McGee and Thomas, 1986; Panagiotou,
2007; Porac, Thomas and Baden-Fuller, 1989;
Reger and Huff,1993) as they make similar strate-
gic choices, share a comparable risk attitude and
skill base (Caves and Porter, 1977; Fiegenbaum
and Thomas,1995). Other types of self -assessment
groups are rms with similar geographic focus
(e.g. Lv et al., 2019; Ma, 2016), similar size (e.g.
Baum et al., 2005), or direct rivals (e.g. Park,
2007). Performance comparisons in line with the
2Italics added by authors.
© 2023 British Academy of Management.
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