Summary
The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between the policy purposes of police performance evaluations and the officers’ perceptions of those evaluation experiences in 4 Ontario municipal police services. Institutional theorywas the foundation for this study. Data for this study were collected from 4 policeservices in Ontario, Canada. The data consisted of police performance evaluationpolicies and in-person interviews with 12 officers. Data were inductively coded, and thenthe coded data were subjected to content analysis. Three policy purpose themes and 13 officer perception themes emerged that indicate that: 1) there seems to be a lack ofalignment between the policy purpose theme of assessing work performance and eight of the perception themes; 2) officers perceived performance evaluations as negativelyimpacting their morale; and, 3) healthy relationships with supervisors were more usefulto officers than performance evaluations in terms of performance and career outcomesand progression. Consistent with Institutional theory, officers perceived performanceevaluations to be necessary even with limited utility. The positive social changeimplications stemming from this study include recommendations to police executives toconsider alternative processes in tandem with performance evaluations to improvemorale, in turn creating better opportunities for improved public and officer safety.