What is true about the relationship between performance evaluation and motivation?

The link between performance evaluation and motivation is best explained throughExpectancy Theory. According to this theory, an individual's motivation to exert effort depends on three relationships: Effort-Performance, Performance-Reward, and Rewards-Personal Goals. For an employee to be motivated, theymust have confidence that the effort they exert will lead to a favorable performance evaluation(the Effort-Performance relationship).

Image of Vroom's Expectancy Theory

If an employee believes that no matter how hard they work, the evaluation process is biased, based on luck, or uses unclear criteria (like personality traits rather than measurable behaviors), their motivation will suffer. Furthermore, the employee must believe that a good evaluation will lead to organizational rewards (such as a bonus or promotion) and that those rewards will satisfy their personal goals. If any of these links are weak—for instance, if the evaluation process is perceived as unfair—the entire motivational chain is broken. Therefore, the perceptual process is central to this relationship; it is not the objective reality of the evaluation that motivates, but the employee's perception of its fairness and accuracy.