A social-psychological model of organizational appraisal processes which emphasizes the goals pursued by raters, ratees and other users of performance appraisal is described in this book. The authors suggest ways in which this goal-oriented perspective might be applied in developing, implementing and evaluating performance appraisal systems.

The model emphasizes the context in which appraisal occurs and takes as a starting point the assumption that many of the apparent shortcomings of performance are, in fact, sensible adaptations to the various requirements, pressures and demands of that context.