Publications

February 2021
Tutorial

Assessing Prediction Accuracy of Machine Learning Models

By: Michael Toffel and Natalie Epstein

This video describes how to assess the accuracy of machine learning prediction models, primarily in the context of machine learning models that predict binary outcomes, such as logistic regression, random forest, or nearest neighbor models. After introducing and... View Details

Keywords: Statistics; Experiments; Forecasting and Prediction; Performance Evaluation; AI and Machine Learning

29 Jun 2020
News

How Do Other People Experience You? These 4 Things Determine Your Leadership Profile

October 2003
Article

Bringing Individuals Back In: The Effects of Career Experience on New Firm Founding

By: Rakesh Khurana and Scott A. Shane

Keywords: Personal Development and Career; Business Ventures

14 Sep 2020
Working Paper Summaries

Digital Labor Market Inequality and the Decline of IT Exceptionalism

Keywords: by Ruiqing Cao and Shane Greenstein; Information Technology

12 Apr 2016
News

A clever Harvard experiment with cafeteria workers suggests a simple way to get better work from your employees

Forthcoming
Article

Is Hybrid Work the Best of Both Worlds? Evidence from a Field Experiment

By: Prithwiraj Choudhury, Tarun Khanna, Christos A. Makridis and Kyle Schirmann

This paper reports causal evidence on how the extent of hybrid work—the number of days worked from home relative to days worked from office—affects employee attitudes and performance. Workers who spent around two days in the office each week on average self-reported... View Details

Keywords: Attitudes; Performance Consistency; Employees; Work-Life Balance

March 2018
Case

McKinsey & Company: Early Career Choices (A)

By: Prithwiraj Choudhury, Carin-Isabel Knoop and Nathaniel Schwalb

This case profiles the early career choices faced by three McKinsey associates. The (A) case profiles the dilemma faced by each individual and sets up the class discussion. View Details

Keywords: Early Career Experiences; Career Progression; Experiences; Personal Development and Career; Decision Choices and Conditions; Consulting Industry

Educators

March 2018
Supplement

McKinsey & Company: Early Career Choices (B)

By: Prithwiraj Choudhury, Carin-Isabel Knoop and Nathaniel Schwalb

The (B) case outlines the choices made by the associates in real life and the consequences of such choices. View Details

Keywords: Early Career Experiences; Career Progression; Experiences; Personal Development and Career; Decisions; Outcome or Result; Consulting Industry

2018
Working Paper

Ethical Hedonism? How Consumers' Prosocial Behavior Varies Along the Utilitarian-Hedonic Product Spectrum: Evidence from a Survey Experiment

By: Kristin Sippl

The marketing literature classifies products along a spectrum from utilitarian (e.g. rice) to hedonic (e.g. cannabis), and additionally using terms such as “luxury” and “illicit.” Research in business ethics has proposed a counter-intuitive mismatch between ethics and... View Details

Keywords: Ethics; Luxury; Consumer Behavior; Environmental Sustainability

10 Sep 2014
Working Paper Summaries

Don’t Take ‘No’ for an Answer: An Experiment with Actual Organ Donor Registrations

Keywords: by Judd B. Kessler & Alvin E. Roth

November 2021 (Revised November 2023)
Case

Hitting Home: Amazon and Mary's Place

By: Paul M. Healy, Debora L. Spar and Amy Klopfenstein

In 2020, Amazon, the $386 billion online retail behemoth, built an eight-story shelter for women and families experiencing homelessness on its expanding headquarters in Seattle, Washington. The shelter, operated in partnership with a non-profit organization known as... View Details

Keywords: Business Ethics; Homelessness; Business And Society; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Social Issues; Corporate Accountability; Urban Development; Society; Information Technology; Ethics; Technology Industry; Seattle; United States; North America

Educators

Spring 2016
Article

Has Social Science Taken Over Electoral Campaigns and Should We Regret It?

By: Vincent Pons

Keywords: Data Analytics; Elections; Electoral Campaigns; Persuasion; Randomized Experiments

04 Jan 2021
Working Paper Summaries

Hospital Allocation and Racial Disparities in Health Care

Keywords: by Amitabh Chandra, Pragya Kakani, and Adam Sacarny; Health

11 Mar 2014
Working Paper Summaries

Return Migration and Geography of Innovation in MNEs: A Natural Experiment of On-the-Job Learning of Knowledge Production by Local Workers Reporting to Return Migrants

Keywords: by Prithwiraj Choudhury; Technology

November 2021
Article

The Effects of Retirement on Sense of Purpose in Life: Crisis or Opportunity?

By: Ayse Yemiscigil, Nattavudh Powdthavee and Ashley V. Whillans

Does retirement lead to an existential crisis or present an opportunity to experience a renewed sense of purpose in life? Prior research has documented a negative association between retirement and sense of purpose in life, suggesting that retirement could lead people... View Details

Keywords: Aging; Meaning; Socioeconomic Status; Life Experiences; Retirement; Well-being

Forthcoming
Article

Should Human Capital Development Programs Be Voluntary or Mandatory? Evidence from a Field Experiment

By: Jason Sandvik, Richard Saouma, Nathan Seegert and Christopher Stanton

In a field experiment, we find large differences in productivity treatment effects between voluntary and mandatory workplace mentorship programs. A significant portion of this difference is due to the best employees opting into the program when it is voluntary and... View Details

Keywords: Mentoring; Mentorship Programs; Randomized Controlled Trial; Performance Productivity; Employees; Talent and Talent Management; Programs

2019
Working Paper

A Journal-Based Replication of 'Being Chosen to Lead'

By: Erik Snowberg, Allan Drazen, Anna Dreber and Erkut Y. Ozbay

Recent large-scale replications of social science experiments provide important information on the reliability of experimental research. Unfortunately, there exist no mechanisms to ensure replications are done. We propose such a mechanism: journal-based replication, in... View Details

Keywords: Experiments; Replication; Reliability; Journal-based Replication; Research

March 2021
Article

Experimenting During the Shift to Virtual Team Work: Learnings from How Teams Adapted Their Activities During the COVID-19 Pandemic

By: Ashley V. Whillans, Leslie Perlow and Aurora Turek

Past research has focused on understanding the characteristics of work that are fully virtual or fully collocated. The present study seeks to expand our understanding of team work by studying knowledge workers' experiences as they were suddenly forced to transition to... View Details

Keywords: Team Work; Activities; Virtual Work; Digital Technologies; Groups and Teams; Health Pandemics; Internet and the Web; Adaptation

June 2022
Article

Conservatism Gets Funded? A Field Experiment on the Role of Negative Information in Novel Project Evaluation

By: Jacqueline N. Lane, Misha Teplitskiy, Gary Gray, Hardeep Ranu, Michael Menietti, Eva C. Guinan and Karim R. Lakhani

The evaluation and selection of novel projects lies at the heart of scientific and technological innovation, and yet there are persistent concerns about bias, such as conservatism. This paper investigates the role that the format of evaluation, specifically information... View Details

Keywords: Project Evaluation; Innovation; Knowledge Frontier; Information Sharing; Negativity Bias; Projects; Innovation and Invention; Information; Knowledge Sharing