Deck 8: Pay Careers and Changing Employment Relationships

Question 1

A goal of performance appraisal is to provide information for managerial decision making.

Answer 1

True

Question 2

According to procedural justice theory, procedures used to appraise performance must be perceived as fair in order for motivation to be high.

Answer 2

True

Question 3

Observations of how coworkers are treated have little influence on the formation of psychological contracts.

Answer 3

False
Employees observe how they are treated, how their coworkers are treated, what kinds of decisions are made and in what manner, how their managers behave, and how outcomes are distributed in an organization to form their psychological contracts.

Question 4

The two major types of psychological contracts are transactional and relational.

Question 5

A goal of performance appraisal is to encourage high levels of employee motivation and performance.

Question 6

If psychological contracts are intentionally breached by an organization in significant ways, then employees' levels of trust in the organization plummet.

Question 7

An employment situation with an initial probationary period during which either party can terminate the relationship is a transactional contract.

Question 8

Psychological contracts can be subject to errors and biases.

Question 9

Manufacturing jobs continue to be outsourced, but white-collar jobs have remained in the USA.

Question 10

Relational contracts imply mutual commitment on the part of both parties.

Question 11

Transactional contracts are general, long-term agreements that evolve gradually over time.

Question 12

In the workplace, an exchange relationship involves the outcomes an organization has promised to provide and the contributions an employee is obligated to make.

Question 13

Performance appraisals provide employees and supervisors with career planning information.

Question 14

Because psychological contracts are formed by the perceptions of all parties, written documentation does not affect them.

Question 15

Psychological contracts can begin to form before a prospective employee even joins an organization.

Question 16

A realistic job preview (RJP) is a sales pitch designed to attract highly qualified employees.

Question 17

Organizations and their employees seldom seek to abide by psychological contracts.

Question 18

A psychological contract is an employee's perception of his or her exchange relationship with an organization.

Question 19

To promote motivation, satisfaction, and retention of employees, organizations should provide prospective employees with realistic job previews.

Question 20

In transactional contracts, individuals focus primarily on extrinsic outcomes such as pay.

Question 21

Subjective measures of performance are based on facts.

Question 22

A downside of 360-degree appraisals is the fear that they might turn into popularity contests.

Question 23

Because peer appraisals are subjective, they are not useful in measuring performance.

Question 24

Behaviorally anchored rating scales (BARS) can be used to assess traits, behaviors, or results.

Question 25

The use of traits to evaluate worker performance has little motivational impact because traits are relatively durable and resistant to change in the short term.

Question 26

Relying on behaviors to assess performance is especially useful because it lets employees know what they should do differently on the job.

Question 27

When a performance appraisal is formal, the performance dimensions and the way employees are evaluated on them are determined in advance.

Question 28

Employees and courts of law involved in cases of potential employment discrimination are likely to view trait-based performance appraisals as unfair.

Question 29

The contrast effect occurs when people's perceptions of a person are influenced by their perception of others in an organization.

Question 30

Graphic rating scales are popular in organizations because they are relatively easy to construct and use.

Question 31

On a typical behaviorally anchored rating scale (BARS), each point on the scale is open to interpretation.

Question 32

Informal performance appraisals are NOT beneficial since they are not formal and employees learn little about their behaviors.

Question 33

The primacy effect occurs when perceptions of a person are influenced by an evaluator's knowledge of the person's standing on a predictor of performance.

Question 34

A 360-degree appraisal compiles evaluations from 360 discrete appraisers.

Question 35

Employee self-appraisals are an accurate way of measuring on-the-job performance.

Question 36

Traits or individual differences alone are reliable predictors of performance.

Question 37

When results are used to appraise performance, the focus is not on what employees do on the job but on the effects of their behaviors, or their actual output.

Question 38

It is desirable for subordinate appraisals to be anonymous.

Question 39

When traits are used to assess performance, personal characteristics that are deemed relevant to job performance are evaluated.

Question 40

When a hotel reservations clerk is assessed on her ability to make accurate reservations and accommodate the requests of guests, behaviors are being used.

Question 41

Gain-sharing plans are likely to encourage camaraderie and a team spirit among employees.

Question 42

According to the principle of comparable worth, pay rates should be determined by the type of person who usually performs the job.

Question 43

A plan that bases pay on performance is often called a merit pay plan.

Question 44

Employees participating in profit-sharing plans receive a certain share of an organization's profits.

Question 45

Merit pay plans are rarely an effective means to motivate nonmanagement workers.

Question 46

Salary increase plans tend to have a greater impact on motivation than bonus plans do.

Question 47

A salary gap no longer exists between men and women.

Question 48

The Scanlon plan focuses on reducing costs.

Question 49

Equity theory indicates that outcomes (pay) should be distributed in proportion to inputs (performance).

Question 50

The primacy effect occurs when a subordinate who made a good first impression on his supervisor receives a better performance appraisal than he deserves.

Question 51

A career can be defined as the sum of work-related experiences throughout one's lifetime.

Question 52

The principle of comparable worth is easy to put into practice in the workplace.

Question 53

Merit pay is not as motivational as non-performance based pay.

Question 54

Pay is a central aspect of psychological contracts and a key component of exchange relationships between employees and an organization.

Question 55

Pay plans based solely on individual performance are called gain-sharing plans.

Question 56

Employees operating under full commission plans are likely to adopt a highly individualized approach to their jobs and not work together as a team.

Question 57

When employees are highly interdependent and individual performance levels cannot be assessed accurately, an individual-based pay-for-performance plan is not a viable option.

Question 58

Effectively managing the careers of its members helps an organization motivate them to achieve individual and organizational goals and to perform at high levels.

Question 59

The similar-to-me effect occurs when a supervisor gives a subordinate who is similar to her a higher performance appraisal than the subordinate deserves.

Question 60

Huge pay differentials between those at the top of the corporate hierarchy and those lower down raise concerns about distributive justice.

Question 61

A(n) ________ is an employee's perception of his or her exchange relationship with an organization.

A) psychological contract
B) employment contract
C) unwritten agreement
D) physiological agreement

Question 62

During the second career stage, organizational entry, people try to find a job that will be a good start to their chosen career.

Question 63

A psychological contract that is ________ in nature focuses on extrinsic outcomes.

A) relational
B) transactional
C) controversial
D) professional

Question 64

An associate professor of management leaves university teaching to direct an HR department at a large company, and then leaves after ten years to start a consulting company. This is an example of a spiral career.

Question 65

Initial career stages are affected by factors related to the Big Five dimensions of personality.

Question 66

Which of the following observations does NOT help employees form their psychological contracts?

A) treatment of coworkers
B) behaviors of managers
C) distribution of outcomes
D) experiences of colleagues

Question 67

One of the ways companies can help dual-career couples is by offering flexible working arrangements to allow employees to take time off when needed.

Question 68

Which of the following written documents are NOT influential in helping individuals form their psychological contracts?

A) instruction manuals for products
B) compensation and benefits policies
C) performance appraisal materials
D) career development manuals

Question 69

Career plateaus may be the result of the hierarchical nature of most organizations where there are fewer and fewer positions to be promoted into as employees advance.

Question 70

A person is said to have reached a career plateau when the chances of being promoted within his or her organization or another organization are slim.

Question 71

Realistic job previews do NOT promote ________ of employees.

A) motivation
B) satisfaction
C) retention
D) education

Question 72

Employees face obsolescence when their knowledge and skills become outmoded and prevent them from effectively performing their organizational roles.

Question 73

During the achievement phase of the early career stage, newcomers are motivated to learn how to perform their jobs, what is expected of them, and how to fit in.

Question 74

A steady-state career reflects a one-time commitment to a certain kind of job that is maintained throughout a person's working life.

Question 75

All of the following are determinants of psychological contracts EXCEPT ________.

A) direct communication
B) observations
C) written documents
D) education

Question 76

Which of the following is FALSE regarding psychological contracts?

A) They are perceptual in nature.
B) They refer to perceived exchange relationships between employees and organizations.
C) They are seldom subject to errors and biases.
D) Organizations and organizational members generally seek to abide by psychological contracts.

Question 77

Obsolescence is caused by changes in technology or in an organization's competitive environment that alter how jobs are performed.

Question 78

In a linear career, a person progresses through a sequence of jobs, and each job entails progress over the prior one in terms of responsibility, skills needed, and so on.

Question 79

An example of a ________ is an employment situation in which there is an initial probationary period, during which either party can terminate the relationship.

A) interactive contract
B) transactional contract
C) relational contract
D) contingency contract

Question 80

The boundaryless career is not tied to a single organization; rather it involves a variety of work experiences in different organizations.