Future Utility Analysis Research: Continue, but Expand the Cognitive and Strategic Focus

Boudreau, John W.

Future Utility Analysis Research: Continue, but Expand the Cognitive and Strategic Focus

Abstract

[Excerpt] Does utility analysis research have a future? I believe the answer depends on how we contemplate the nature of such research. The distinction between two potential paths has never been more apparent. On the one hand, as researchers, industrial psychologists and others have accumulated decades of utility analysis applications and proposals for new utility approaches and estimation methods. Numerous utility applications exist, especially in selection. Spirited debates have occurred in the scholarly journals on such topics as the value of capital budgeting (Hunter, Schmidt & Coggin, 1988), the appropriate underlying conceptual utility model for scaling performance differences into dollars (Raju, Burke & Normand, 1990), and the appropriate measure of dollar-valued performance variability (SDy) (see Boudreau, 1991 for a review). One would think that after such a long and public history, we would have a set of accepted principles that might guide utility analysis applications, measurement and theory. Unfortunately, we do not. The title of this symposium testifies to the ongoing consternation faced by the scientific community about utility analysis.

Date Issued

1995-08-01

Keywords

utility; analysis; research human resource; human; resource; turnover; performance; salary; employee; model; pay; perform; cost

Types

preprint