PREDICTION OF MULTIDIMENSIONAL CRITERIA - DISTINGUISHING TASK AND CONTEXTUAL PERFORMANCE

This study reports the results of a concurrent validation designed to test recent multidimensional theories of job performance. Drawing on B orman and Motowidlo's (1993, 1997) distinctions between task and conte xtual performance, several alternative measures of performance were ex amined to assess their unique relations with alternative predictor mea sures. As expected, results indicated that a measure of cognitive abil ity added incrementally to the prediction of sales performance after c ontrolling for conscientiousness, but did not add incrementally to the prediction of absenteeism, tardiness, or organizational citizenship. In contrast, a measure of conscientiousness added incrementally to the prediction of absenteeism and citizenship after controlling for cogni tive ability, but did not add to the prediction of sales performance o r tardiness. The implications of the results for theory building in th e area of criterion measurement, and some practical implications of th e results for personnel selection, are discussed.