Behavioral, Cognitive, and Technological Approaches to Performance Improvement

Often, training fails to improve organizational outcomes. Increasingly, practitioners are assuming a performance improvement perspective that takes a holistic and systemic perspective in analyzing causes of and solutions for gaps in organizational results. We review the models and evidence for three perspectives on performance improvement: behavioral engineering, cognitive–motivational, and technological. The behavioral engineering models prevalent among U.S. practitioneroriented professional societies apply a pragmatic systemic approach that evaluates performance factors at the organizational, process, and individual worker or team levels. The cognitive–motivational approaches prevalent among industrial and organizational psychologists include guidelines for goal setting, feedback, and incentives. The cognitive models are based on empirical evidence and incorporate motivational and cognitive moderators of their interventions. Recent advances in computer technology offer opportunities to deliver performance support in new ways. In our discussion of technological approaches, we focus primarily on the evolution of and evidence for electronic performance support systems (EPSSs) in the workplace.