Subjective Performance Evaluation, Influence Activities, and Bureaucratic Work Behavior: Evidence from China

Alain de Janvry, Guojun He, Elisabeth Sadoulet, Shaoda Wang and Qiong Zhang

American Economic Review, 2023, vol. 113, issue 3, 766-99

Abstract: Subjective performance evaluation could induce influence activities: employees might devote too much effort to pleasing their evaluator, relative to working toward the goals of the organization itself. We conduct a randomized field experiment among Chinese local civil servants to study the existence and implications of influence activities. We find that civil servants do engage in evaluator-specific influence to affect evaluation outcomes, partly in the form of reallocating work efforts toward job tasks that are more important and observable to the evaluator. Importantly, we show that introducing uncertainty about the evaluator's identity discourages evaluator-specific influence activities and improves bureaucratic work performance.

JEL-codes: D73 H83 J45 M54 O17 O18 P25 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (9)

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Working Paper: Subjective Performance Evaluation, Influence Activities, and Bureaucratic Work Behavior: Evidence from China (2022)
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DOI: 10.1257/aer.20211207

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