Clarifying the knowledge map of performance management research in China has important value and guiding significance for the in-depth study of performance management. Scientific bibliometric methods and CiteSpace visualization tools are used to quantitatively demonstrate the evolution of research in the field of performance management in the Chinese context since 1975 through keyword co-occurrence and cluster analysis. The research in this field can be divided into two phases based on the annual number of publications on this topic: the exploration phase (1975-2014), and the systematic deepening and simultaneous innovation phase (2015-2022). The keyword clustering of papers in the two phases of performance management research in the Chinese context was conducted, and the dynamic process of performance management research in the Chinese context over time was quantitatively demonstrated through keyword clustering timeline view and keyword strategy map.Based on the keyword strategy map and keyword emergence map of research literature in the field in the past decade, the future trend of performance management research hotspots in the Chinese context is proposed.