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Biased self-assessments, feedback, and employees' compensation plan choices

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  • Brown, Jason L.
  • Farrington, Sukari
  • Sprinkle, Geoffrey B.

Abstract

We conduct a laboratory experiment to examine how task difficulty and different types of performance feedback – none, individual, and relative – affect individuals' selection of either a fixed pay contract or a relative-performance-based pay contract that provides a bonus for above-average performance. We find that participants exhibit a strong better-than-average bias in assessing their relative skills on easy tasks and a moderate worse-than-average bias in assessing their relative skills on difficult tasks. In turn, these biases guide compensation plan choices, leading to participants being more likely to inappropriately select performance-based pay than fixed pay when a task is easy versus when a task is difficult. Our results regarding performance feedback suggest that the provision of individual performance feedback does not exacerbate participants' preferences for relative-performance-based pay when working on an easy task or exacerbate participants' preferences for fixed pay when working on a difficult task. However, we find some evidence that the provision of relative performance feedback has an asymmetric effect on the relation between task difficulty and compensation plan selection. Specifically, when working on an easy task, participants' compensation plan choices were similar between the no feedback and relative feedback conditions, but participants working on a difficult task were more likely to choose relative-performance-based pay in the relative feedback condition than in the no feedback condition. We further find that the relation between task difficulty and compensation plan selection is fully mediated by participants' assessments of their relative skill. Finally we find that performance-based pay does, on average, attract participants with higher skill levels and that risk preferences play an important role in compensation plan selection.

Suggested Citation

  • Brown, Jason L. & Farrington, Sukari & Sprinkle, Geoffrey B., 2016. "Biased self-assessments, feedback, and employees' compensation plan choices," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 45-59.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:aosoci:v:54:y:2016:i:c:p:45-59
    DOI: 10.1016/j.aos.2016.08.003
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    Cited by:

    1. Armanu Armanu, 2017. "The Role of Shared Leadership and Work Environment in Strengthening the Influence of Compensation on Nurse's Performance," European Research Studies Journal, European Research Studies Journal, vol. 0(3A), pages 82-95.
    2. Nicole Nikiforow & Sebastian Wagener, 2021. "The contextual effect of completion on the effectiveness of performance feedback," Journal of Business Economics, Springer, vol. 91(1), pages 61-90, February.
    3. Lisa-Marie Wibbeke & Maik Lachmann, 2020. "Psychology in management accounting and control research: an overview of the recent literature," Journal of Management Control: Zeitschrift für Planung und Unternehmenssteuerung, Springer, vol. 31(3), pages 275-328, September.
    4. Jason L. Brown & Patrick R. Martin & Geoffrey B. Sprinkle & Dan Way, 2023. "How Return on Investment and Residual Income Performance Measures and Risk Preferences Affect Risk-Taking," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(2), pages 1301-1322, February.

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