Can We Talk? Improving Employee Contextual Performance Using Motivating Language and Feedback Orientation

This study sought to determine whether motivating language theory and feedback orientation theory connect, and if so, whether or not this impacts employee contextual performance in the workplace. Survey data was collected from 458 individuals (142 undergraduate students, and a national sample of 316 employees). Statistically significant relationships were observed between motivating language and feedback orientation, between motivating language and contextual performance, and between feedback orientation and contextual performance. Feedback orientation was found to moderate the relationship between motivating language and contextual performance. Implications and generalizability of these theories to other settings are presented.

Feedback Environment: A Meta-Analysis

Feedback environment reflects the perceptions of the contextual, day-to-day feedback process within supervisor-subordinate relationships. Here, we present a comprehensive meta-analysis of the feedback environment literature. Based on K = 112 independent samples, representing N = 31,089 workers, results suggest that feedback environment is positively related to feedback orientation (rc = .42), leader–member exchange (rc = .81), supervisor-rated performance (rc = .29), and negatively related to burnout (rc = -.51). Moreover, we present multiple regression and relative weights analyses to consider the unique and incremental predictive power of feedback environment above-and-beyond two related constructs: leader–member exchange and feedback orientation. The results suggest that feedback environment explains unique variance in several correlates and is a particularly important predictor of (lower) burnout.