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Prior studies on the impact of incentives on physicians’ online participation mainly focused on different incentives while ignoring the difficulty of setting monetary incentives efficiently. Based on goal-setting theory, the current research examines the relationship between incentives with goals of varying difficulty and professional health knowledge sharing (PHKS) in online health knowledge-sharing platforms (OHKSPs).

Four field experiments with different monetary incentives were conducted by one of China’s largest OHKSPs, with whom the researchers cooperated in data collection. Monthly panel data on 10,584 physicians were collected from September 2018 to December 2019. There were 9,376 physicians in the treatment group and 1,208 in the control group. The authors used a difference-in-difference (DID) model to explore the research question based on the same control group and the Chow test with seemingly unrelated estimation (sureg) to compare regression coefficients between four groups. Several robustness checks were performed to validate the main results, including a relative time model, multiple falsification tests and a DID estimation using the propensity score matching method.

The results show that the monetary incentive significantly positively affected the volume of physicians’ PHKS directly with negative spillover to the duration of physicians’ PHKS. Moreover, the positive effect of incentives with higher difficulty on the volume of physicians’ PHKS was significantly smaller than that of incentives with low difficulty. Finally, professional title had a positive moderating effect on the volume of goal difficulty setting and did not significantly moderate the effect on the duration of physicians’ PHKS.

Some limitations of this study are: firstly, because the field experiments were enterprise benefit oriented, the treatment and control groups were not balanced. Secondly, the experiments for different incentive measures were relatively similar, making it challenging to validate a causal effect. Finally, more consideration should be given to the strategy for setting hierarchical incentives in future research.

The research indicates that monetary incentives have a bilateral effect on PHKS, i.e. a positive direct effect on the volume of physicians’ contributions and a negative spillover effect on the duration of physicians’ PHKS. The professional titles of physicians also moderate such bilateral switches of PHKS. Furthermore, when a physician’s energy is limited, the goal difficulty setting of the incentive mechanism tends to be low. The more difficult the incentives are, the more inefficient the effects on physicians’ PHKS will be.

Recent innovations in management control systems, such as the Balanced Scorecard System, reflect today’s complex business environment by accounting for performance in multiple areas. When individuals must allocate their time between multiple areas that compete for their time, the manner in which incentives are structured is hypothesized to influence their decisions differently depending on goal difficulty. A decision-making experiment was conducted to test this proposition. When incentives were structured so that each area of the Balanced Scorecard is rewarded separately, challenging goals received more planned attention than easy or unattainable goals following previous findings. When incentives were structured so that goals in all areas must be achieved together, the influence of goal difficulty on the time planning decision diverges from previous findings such that areas having unattainable goals receive the same planned attention as areas having challenging goals. The results suggest that companies must consider how performance is rewarded within a Balanced Scorecard framework.

Due to the popularity of mobile devices and the development of artificial intelligence (AI), AI-powered mobile fitness applications (MFAs) have entered people's daily lives. However, the extant literature lacks empirical investigations that explore users' continuance usage intentions regarding AI-powered MFAs. To fill this research gap, this paper employs goal-setting theory to establish a research model for exploring how AI-enabled features (i.e. intelligence and anthropomorphism) affect users' perceptions of goal difficulties and goal specificities, which in turn affect their MFA continuance usage intentions.

This paper uses a survey method to analyze the research model, and a total of 223 responses are collected. The partial least squares (PLS) technique is utilized for data analysis.

The results show that intelligence and anthropomorphism affect the continuance usage intention of MFA users through their goal difficulty and specificity. Both intelligence and anthropomorphism positively influence goal specificity, whereas they negatively affect goal difficulty. In addition, goal specificity increases users' MFA continuance usage intention, whereas goal difficulty decreases users' continuance usage intention. The findings of this study provide theoretical contributions for AI technology adoption research and offer practical strategies for firms to retain MFA users.

Based on goal-setting theory, this study reveals that as two primary AI features of contemporary mobile fitness apps, intelligence and anthropomorphism, can increase comprehension of users' perceptions regarding goal difficulty and specificity in the context of users' continuance usage intentions toward AI-powered MFAs.

This study adopts a goal setting theory as the theoretical framework for studying the motivational effect of budgetary participation on job performance. This study proposes that budgetary participation affects job performance via two intervening variables, namely budget goal difficulty and budget goal commitment. The results show that budgetary participation enhances job performance directly and indirectly via budget goal difficulty and budget goal commitment.

Numerous accounting studies have investigated the effects of participatory budgetary processes. The job satisfaction of participating employees is one of the most frequently researched issues. Increased employee participation in budgeting widens the responsibilities and experience of employees. However, it might also increase the level of task difficulty and reduce task clarity. The purpose of this study is to design an improved budgeting system for subordinates so as to enhance job satisfaction in a working environment of difficult task setting and low goal clarity.

The present paper employs two models (direct and indirect) to investigate the level of employee satisfaction during budgetary participation, focusing on the hotel industry in Macau.

The direct model suggests that task difficulty and clarity do not directly affect satisfaction levels among employees during budgetary participation. However, the indirect model suggests that, under conditions of increased task difficulty and unclear goal situations, the level of job satisfaction is mediated indirectly through the influence of four core dimensions (budget variety, autonomy, task identity, and feedback). The study thus finds that improved design of budgetary processes, taking account of four core dimensions (budget variety, autonomy, task identity, and feedback), produces greater job satisfaction among employees who are desirous of satisfying higher‐order needs. Moreover, these employees are rated by superiors as performing higher‐quality work during the budgetary process.

The paper contributes to the budgeting literature in several ways. It confirms the beneficial effect of improved budgetary design in enhancing employees' job satisfaction in a working environment of task difficulty and unclear goal setting, which is particularly important in the hotel industry and other service sectors. The paper also extends the literature that has hitherto typically focused on the examination of factors that affect the level of employees' job satisfaction, and recognizes the importance of budgetary design to job satisfaction.

The performance measurement literature suggests that companies should consider increasing the diversity of their performance measures to embrace both financial and non‐financial measures. The purpose of this paper is to examine whether the use of multiple performance measures which includes both financial and non‐financial measures in evaluating subordinates' performance (reliance on multiple performance measures (RMPM)) affects their performance, or whether the effect is contingent on the specificity and difficulty of the goals contained in the measures.

A questionnaire survey to various functional managers within a single organization supported by interviews.

The effect of RMPM on subordinate managers' performance is contingent on goal specificity. However, the paper does not find the same results for goal difficulty. These findings are discussed within the context of the organization studied.

The samples are from a single organization. Further work would be needed to examine whether the results are generalizable into other organizations and/or settings.

The paper provides insight on how performance measures used to evaluate managers should be designed.

This paper contributes to the literature on supervisory evaluative style, performance measure diversity and goal‐setting theory.

This study examines the relationship between a number of goal characteristics and the propensity of divisional managers to create budgetary slack. These goal characteristics are variables in goal clarity and goal difficulty. Managers also consider communication and reward systems – which are significant factors affecting the relationship between goal characteristics and propensity to create budget slack. The communication and reward systems are affected by influencing power of managers, required explanation of budget variance, budgetary feedback, peer relations, and relationship between superiors and subordinates. Using a sample of 108 hotel managers in Macau, the findings indicate that the clear communication and reward systems can result in goal clarity and can help to solve budgeting problems under difficult goal situations. The implications of these findings are discussed in relation to the design of budgeting systems. The need to integrate results and develop frameworks for future research is noted.

This paper aims to investigate the mediating and moderating roles of mindfulness in explaining the influences of performance goal attributes (e.g. difficulty, specificity and performance pressure), moral justification and peer unethical sales behavior on unintentional unethical behavior in the sales context. In this study, goal attributes and peer unethical sales behavior are proposed to positively impact unethical selling behavior. Especially, mindfulness and moral justification are explored as mediators of these relationships. Moreover, mindfulness also moderates the influence of peer’s unethical sales behavior on moral justification.

A sample of 188 salespeople working in companies in Vietnam is included to test the conceptual framework. Partial least squares structural equations modeling and SmartPLS v3 were implemented to test the path model.

This study highlights the mediating and moderating roles of mindfulness in explaining unintentional unethical behavior. The findings indicate that sales performance goals negatively influence mindfulness and positively influence unethical behavior. In the mediating role, mindfulness mediates the relationships between goal attributes and moral justification. Further, moral justification also mediates the influence of mindfulness on unethical behavior. In the moderating role, mindfulness plays a significant impact on the positive relationships between peers’ unethical selling behavior and moral justification.

Data are collected from salespeople in Vietnam. Therefore, the results are limited.

While many organizations use goal-setting as a tool to promote employees’ performance, it is warned that goal variables (e.g. difficulty, specificity and performance pressure) may lead to unethical behavior. Interestingly, people may fail to notice moral dilemmas because of focusing on the goals. Furthermore, ethical erosion in organizations may spur unethical selling behavior. Therefore, salespeople sell unethically without intention to do so. Proposing mindfulness as self-regulation, these findings may explain the reasons people display unintentional unethical behavior. Therefore, it is crucial to set performance goals for employees not only to promote their performance but also to prevent unethical behaviors.

By focusing on the roles of mindfulness that foster unintended unethical practices, this study provides important implications for governments and policymakers. For example, governments may emphasize ethical codes to clearly definite which practices are unethical. Moreover, ethics training should be considered to enhance ethical cognition in people.

Emphasizing unintentional unethical selling behaviors in sales context, this study tests a research framework which highlights the roles of mindfulness in explaining the dark effects of performance goals on people’s cognition and behavior. Therefore, this paper contributes to a deeper understanding of ethical blind spots in people’s cognition.

Essentially, performance evaluation is a human behavioural phenomenon involving a cognitive perceptual process. Project performance has two attributes, at least: (1) the individual's expected performance (manifested as assigned goals); and (2) the individual's perceived actual performance. Evaluation comprises the comparison of these two attributes. The present paper develops a research model for project outcome evaluation designed to examine the effects of the two moderators, goal commitment and project complexity, on the perceived project performance of project participants. It is postulated that: (1) there is a positive monotonic relationship between goal difficulty and performance, but that this is moderated by project complexity; (2) difficult goals lead to higher performance, but that this will happen only when the project participant is committed to the goal; and (3) the transferability of critical success factors to enhance/improve the performance of subsequent projects has to be examined and applied in the light of the effects of these two moderators on project performance.

The purpose of this paper is to understand and measure the impact of goal clarity, goal difficulty, and management support on five social and technical outcomes for quality circles (QCs) in a Chinese company.

Survey scales were developed based on previous research and validated using principal component analysis. Analysis of variance confirmed the validity of aggregating individual responses to team-level measures. Models for five outcomes (team member understanding of continuous improvement, team member skills, team member attitudes, team member motivation, and technical success) were developed using multiple regressions.

Goal clarity was found to impact all outcomes. Goal difficulty was found to impact QC team member attitudes. Management support was related to employee's understanding of the value of continuous improvement and to the technical success of QC activities.

All the QCs included in the study were part of a single manufacturing organization. To generalize the findings, data from additional companies are needed.

The results imply that management support is critical to improvement of processes. Even if employees wish to learn new skills, employee's efforts need to be directed, so they are closely aligned with the company's goals and objectives.

This appears to be the first published research study to identify the role of goal clarity, goal difficulty, and management support on both social and technical systems outcomes for Chinese QCs. The findings highlight the value of and need for clearly defined, challenging goals for QC members work on and the need for management support of QC members and QC activities.