Workplace recognition is one of the cornerstones upon which contemporary organisations are built. Merit serves as a tool to guide management on matters such as hiring, promotion, and reward distribution.
But what do we mean by workplace recognition? There is no widespread consensus. How do we identify merit? Is it a skill? Effort? Talent? Passion? A combination of all of these? And, if it is indeed a combination, what elements make up merit?
What will I read about in this article?
- The three dimensions of workplace recognition
- What influences different approaches to evaluating merit in the workplace?
Three Dimensions That Define Workplace Recognition in Organisations
Emilio Castilla, a professor at MIT, and Aruna Ranganathan, a professor at Stanford, set out to unravel the complexity of the concept of merit in the workplace and to understand more specifically what constitutes workplace recognition.
To achieve this, they interviewed forty-one managers with diverse profiles and complemented this sample with eleven additional managers from a single technology company. They also gathered fifty-six qualitative reviews related to workplace decision-making, written and published online by managers from the same technology company.
From this sample, their analysis revealed that managers understand merit through three main dimensions: content, metrics, and unit. Let’s explore each one.
The Content of Workplace Recognition
This defines what makes a person “worthy” of workplace recognition. Responses were divided into two categories: work actions and personal qualities. For some managers, workplace recognition is based solely on productivity, effort, or the application of talent to work, meaning merit is evaluated according to observable actions.
For others, it includes characteristics and personal qualities such as technical or social skills, passion, charisma, or empathy towards others. In this case, evaluation is based on personal qualities.
Metrics
How is workplace recognition measured? Again, there are two seemingly opposing paths: quantitative metrics vs qualitative metrics. For some managers, it can only be measured quantitatively—numbers and measurable outcomes. According to these managers, there are clear criteria for each role, and these are the only ones that count when measuring merit.
For others, it should be measured qualitatively, considering the quality of work, the ideas contributed, the impact on team wellbeing, and so forth. In essence, they believe not everything can be reduced to numerical metrics, and qualitative evaluation is necessary.
The unit
For some, evaluation should be purely individual. It should measure what each person achieves individually and efficiently. For others, the unit is the individual within a team, and evaluation should include not only individual contributions but also the results and dynamics of the team as a whole.
What Influences Different Approaches to Evaluating Workplace Merit?
Based on these three dimensions, Castilla and Ranganathan identified two main approaches that managers adopt towards merit: the focused approach and the diffused approach.
* The focused approach evaluates workplace recognition solely based on work actions, using only quantitative criteria and focusing exclusively on individual performance. Proponents of this approach believe it limits bias, ensures evaluation is clearly specified, and leaves no room for interpretation.
* Conversely, the diffused approach evaluates merit by considering both work actions and personal qualities, using both quantitative and qualitative criteria, and assessing the individual as well as their role within a team. This approach offers a broader and more holistic perspective.
The authors go even further, suggesting that this view of workplace recognition is influenced by how managers were evaluated themselves as employees in the past.
Those who were predominantly judged negatively tend to lean towards a focused approach (work actions, quantitative metrics, and an individual lens), while those who received mostly positive evaluations tend to adopt a diffused approach to merit, combining work actions and personal qualities, quantitative and qualitative metrics, and both individual and collective perspectives.
The study sheds light on the elements that shape workplace recognition and how managers interpret and apply the concept of meritocracy in the workplace. Although the concept remains complex and multifaceted, this study provides additional clarity on its constitutive elements and how past personal experiences shape the different ways merit is understood and applied in organisations.
Bibliography
Castilla, E. J., & Ranganathan, A. (2020). The production of merit: How managers understand and apply merit in the workplace. Organization Science, 31(4), 909–935. https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2019.1335