In their focal article, Pulakos, Mueller Hanson, Arad, and Moye (Reference Pulakos, Mueller Hanson, Arad and Moye2015) have presented a helpful five-step plan for improving the use of performance management (PM) within organizations. As they have pointed out, it is important that an organization's PM system match the organization's values and culture. At the same time, one cannot forget that an organization's PM system should also align with the organization's other human resource (HR) practices. Thus, I suggest that taking time to make sure this alignment happens should be included as a substep under the first step (i.e., plan change) of the model.

Let us take employee selection as an illustration. In the second step of their model, the authors of the focal article have suggested that practitioners should develop role descriptions for employees. As industrial and organizational psychologists, we know the importance of a good job analysis. As such, we also know that we will likely have issues if the role descriptions we develop for a PM system do not align with the job descriptions that we use as part of a selection system. We are unlikely to improve the performance of someone who does not have, or cannot attain, the knowledge, skills, and abilities that are necessary for the job—namely, someone who should not have been selected for the job in the first place.

Further support for the suggestion to align PM with other HR practices can be found in the literature. A number of authors, for example, have reported that there is a relationship between an organization's use of integrated HR practices and outcomes, such as turnover, and both individual and firm performance (for examples, see Arthur, Reference Arthur1994; Huselid, Reference Huselid1995; Richard & Johnson, Reference Richard and Johnson2001). Some of these authors have suggested that an organization's use of integrated HR practices is a source of competitive advantage over other organizations (Richard & Johnson, Reference Richard and Johnson2001). Similarly, Becker and Gerhart (Reference Becker and Gerhart1996) noted that HR practices improve firm performance by improving efficiency. It is difficult to imagine that misaligned practices are efficient.

As industrial and organizational psychologists, we can build on the useful model that Pulakos et al. (Reference Pulakos, Mueller Hanson, Arad and Moye2015) have presented by including a substep in the model: We should take time to make sure that our PM practices align with the other HR practices used within organizations. Although this integration is difficult, it is important (den Hartog, Boselie, & Paauwe, Reference den Hartog, Boselie and Paauwe2004). Unlike the proverbial cheese in the children's song, within organizations, PM does not stand alone.