Justice Delayed is Justice Denied: Managing Contracting Performance for Equal Employment Opportunity Discrimination Complaints.

This article examines factors influencing the performance of federal agencies’ contracting use in the Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) discrimination complaint process, focusing on timeliness as a key performance measure. Drawing on contracting theories, it finds that agencies using a performance-based incentive structure (i.e., case-based pay) for contractors experience improved timeliness in complaint resolution compared to those using input-based (time-based) incentives. Additionally, the study shows that employing contractors owned by socially and economically disadvantaged individuals (small disadvantaged-owned contractors) positively moderates the relationship between contracting use and agency performance, while no significant effect is found for women-owned contractors. These findings highlight the importance of aligning incentive structures and considering contractor ownership to enhance contracting outcomes in complex human resource management tasks that uphold democratic-constitutional values such as fairness and equity.