The prediction of task and contextual performance by political skill: A meta-analysis and moderator test

Abstract

Political skill is a relatively newly articulated construct. Despite its novelty, it has been investigated in a variety of contexts, showing promise not only as a descriptor of several organizational phenomena, but also as a predictor of job performance. Given this status, it seems appropriate to review the empirical literature to this point for political skill's overall viability as a predictor of job performance (i.e., task and contextual performance), as well as to investigate one potential moderator of the political skill-to-performance relationship, namely, the interpersonal and social requirements of occupations. We present a brief review of political skill. We then describe juxtaposed theoretical positions from which are derived two very different patterns representing the relationship between the social requirements of occupations and the strength of the political skill-to-performance ratings correlation. Next, we meta-analyze known studies that link political skill scores to ratings of task and contextual performance to test these differing predictions. Results indicate that on-the-average political skill is a valid predictor of both task and contextual performance ratings. However, as the interpersonal and social requirements of the occupations increased, so did the strength of the positive relationship between political skill and task performance ratings. Also as hypothesized, political skill was found to be a better predictor of contextual performance than task performance. Implications for personnel selection and training practices are discussed, and future research directions are suggested.