The performance feedback process: A preliminary model

Informal performance feedback from supervisors can have a significant and generally desirable impact on the performance and job-related attitudes of their subordinates. A model of the overall feedback process is outlined. The model is concerned with the factors that influence supervisors' performance feedback behavior, as well as with the effects that giving feedback can have on both the subordinate and the supervisor him/herself. Empirical evidence bearing on this model is reviewed, and several of the model's major implications are discussed.