DISTRIBUTIONAL RATINGS OF PERFORMANCE LEVELS AND VARIABILITY - AN EXAMINATION OF RATING VALIDITY IN A FIELD SETTING

The performance distribution assessment (PDA) method was purported to be a breakthrough in performance appraisal methodology; however, littl e research has been conducted to determine the usefulness of this meth od This article describes some of the critical features of the PDA met hod and presents evidence supporting the validity of the PDA in an org anizational setting. The performance and ability data of 397 sewing ma chine operators were analyzed to determine the validity of multiple pe rformance measures derived from the PDA, the relative accuracy of the PDA compared with an evaluative rating method, and differential criter ion-related validities for the multiple PDA performance measures. Resu lts revealed significant correlations between the PDA-derived performa nce measures and objective measures of job performance, differential c orrelations between ability and the multiple PDA-derived performance m easures, and equivalent levels of rating accuracy for the PDA and the evaluative measure of typical performance. implications for research a nd practice are discussed.