Job Evaluation As Institutional Myth

This article argues that the real function of job evaluation technique lies not in the rational claims upheld in the managerialist literature but rather in the more diffuse area of meaning management. the argument is based on an intensive case‐survey analysis of the introduction of a formal job evaluation plan to one of Canada's ten provincial governments. From the complementary perspectives of social construction theory and institutional theory, job evaluation is ultimately defined as a rationalized institutional myth. First of all, job evaluation is rationalized because it takes the form of rules, specifying the procedures necessary to accomplish the end goal of determining an internally equitable and externally competitive pay structure. Job evaluation is institutional because actions are repeated and given similar meanings by the custodians of the system and those who fall under its administration. the set of meanings which evolves from job evaluation is expressed in a belief (ideology), an activity (norms and rituals), language and other symbolic forms through which the members of an organization both create and sustain views and images about the value of one job over another. Job evaluation is a myth because it is a process based on widely held beliefs that cannot be tested objectively. Despite a number of unexamined assumptions, the technique is accepted as ‘true’because it is believed.