Performance and political skill in personal reputation assessments
Abstract
Purpose
Reputation has many positive outcomes, but little is known about how individuals manage their personal reputation at work. This study aims to investigate the relationships between job performance and political skill on personal reputation.
Design/methodology/approach
Ninety‐eight triads from a Midwestern manufacturer provided data. Employees rated their political skill, supervisors rated the employees' job performance, and coworkers rated the employees' personal reputation. The white‐collar respondents were mostly Caucasian, female, middle aged, and moderately tenured in their position. The data were analyzed with regression analysis.
Findings
The results illustrated positive political skill‐personal reputation and job performance ‐personal reputation relationships. Job performance was positively associated with personal reputation for politically skilled employees, but not for individuals low in political skill.
Research limitations/implications
Job performance was evaluated by employees' supervisors, but less subjective, quantitative measures of job performance would be helpful.
Practical implications
Political skill training and/or mentoring relationships may help individuals manage their personal reputation at work.
Social implications
This study focused on personal reputation in a work environment. However, the results also may be useful to individuals in a variety of organizations (e.g. schools, clubs, churches).
Originality/value
This is one of the first studies to investigate how individuals manage their personal reputation in a work setting. Unlike previous research that used self‐evaluations of personal reputation, this study uses peer evaluations, which is more appropriate for the construct.
Keywords
Citation
Dana Laird, M., Zboja, J.J., Martinez, A.D. and Ferris, G.R. (2013), "Performance and political skill in personal reputation assessments", Journal of Managerial Psychology, Vol. 28 No. 6, pp. 661-676. https://doi.org/10.1108/JPM-10-2011-0097
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2013, Emerald Group Publishing Limited