Designs for evaluating the validity and accuracy of performance ratings

For many jobs, objective measures of performance are not available or are impractical to obtain, such that ratings are the sole source of information. Unfortunately, performance ratings are a distorted source of information. The multitrait-multimethod and person perception designs have been used to investigate the distortions in ratings. The purpose of using these research designs is to isolate the factors that distort the ratings and to use this knowledge to improve the quality of performance ratings. The goal of the present research was to develop a design that combined both the multitrait-multimethod and person perception designs. Each design was discussed, and examples were presented to illustrate that design. The combination design was used to isolate the influence of rater, ratee, and context factors on the quality of performance ratings. Future research was recommended to understand and utilize these factors to improve performance ratings.