Publications

2002
Chapter

Pay for Performance: Motivation and Selection Effects

By: Felix Oberholzer-Gee and Iris Bohnet

Article

Financial Incentives for Exercise Adherence in Adults: Systematic Review and Meta-analysis

By: Marc S. Mitchell, Jack M. Goodman, David A. Alter, Leslie K. John, Paul I. Oh, Maureen T. Pakosh and Guy E. Faulkner

Context Less than 5% of U.S. adults accumulate the required dose of exercise to maintain health. Behavioral economics has stimulated renewed interest in economic-based, population-level health interventions to address this issue. Despite widespread implementation of... View Details

Keywords: Exercise; Health; Behavior; Motivation and Incentives

January 2020
Article

The Job Rating Game: Revolving Doors and Analyst Incentives

By: Elisabeth Kempf

Investment banks frequently hire analysts from rating agencies. While many argue that this "revolving door" creates captured analysts, it can also create incentives to improve accuracy. To study this issue, I construct an original dataset, linking analysts to their... View Details

Keywords: Credit Rating Agencies; Investment Banking; Recruitment; Performance Evaluation; Financial Services Industry

November 2001 (Revised April 2003)
Case

Camp Dresser & McKee: Getting Incentives Right

By: Ashish Nanda

"If you try to use money to motivate behavior, you are in a powerful and dangerous place, especially with engineers and scientists," remarked Tom Furman, CEO of Camp Dresser & McKee, Inc. (CDM), a consulting environmental engineering firm. Historically, CDM had... View Details

Keywords: Motivation and Incentives; Compensation and Benefits; Service Industry

13 Aug 2012
Research & Ideas

When Good Incentives Lead to Bad Decisions

Among the culprits contributing to the recent financial crisis were bank loan officers who approved mortgage loans that were doomed to fail. Many of these frontline workers were motivated by bonuses and... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Banking

January 1996
Background Note

The Motivation for Creativity in Organizations

By: Teresa M. Amabile

People will be most creative when they feel motivated primarily by the interest, enjoyment, satisfaction, and challenge of the work itself--when they are driven by a deep involvement in their work and a passion for it. This note describes the ways in which creativity... View Details

Keywords: Compensation and Benefits; Managerial Roles; Organizations; Creativity; Motivation and Incentives; Satisfaction

Mar 2012
Article

The Incentive Bubble

The past three decades have seen American capitalism quietly transformed by a single, powerful idea--that financial markets are a suitable tool for measuring performance and structuring compensation. Stock instruments for managers,... View Details

April 2000
Background Note

Aligning Incentives for Supply Chain Efficiency

By: V.G. Narayanan and Ananth Raman

Introduces students to the basics of principal-agency theory as it applies to supply chains. Operational problems in supply chains can often be traced to incentive issues. Students and managers lack frameworks to analyze incentive problems in supply chains. This note... View Details

Keywords: Supply Chain Management; Motivation and Incentives; Framework; Management Analysis, Tools, and Techniques; Agency Theory

1982
Article

The Economics of Matching: Stability and Incentives

By: Alvin E. Roth

Keywords: Balance and Stability; Motivation and Incentives; Economics

Article

The Conversational Circumplex: Identifying, Prioritizing, and Pursuing Informational and Relational Motives in Conversation

By: Michael Yeomans, Maurice E. Schweitzer and Alison Wood Brooks

The meaning of success in conversation depends on people’s goals. Often, individuals pursue multiple goals simultaneously, such as establishing shared understanding, making a favorable impression, and persuading a conversation partner. In this article, we introduce a... View Details

Keywords: Conversation; Goal Pursuit; Communication; Interpersonal Communication; Goals and Objectives; Framework

2017
Article

The Energizing Nature of Work Engagement: Toward a New Need-Based Theory of Work Motivation

By: Paul Green, Eli Finkel, Grainne Fitzsimons and Francesca Gino

We present theory suggesting that experiences at work that meet employees’ expectations of need fulfillment drive work engagement. Employees have needs (e.g., a desire to be authentic) and they also have expectations for how their job or their organization will fulfill... View Details

Keywords: Needs; Motivation; Work Engagement; Disengagement; Authenticity; Self-Expression; Employees; Motivation and Incentives; Behavior; Human Needs

March 2010 (Revised February 2014)
Case

Community Health Workers in Zambia: Incentive Design and Management

By: Nava Ashraf and Natalie Kindred

This case examines the various considerations relevant to selecting and compensating workers in a context where their work involves a pro-social component. This is relevant to not only health care in Zambia, but to NGO and public sector workers who are both motivated... View Details

Keywords: Developing Countries and Economies; Training; Health Care and Treatment; Compensation and Benefits; Recruitment; Selection and Staffing; Mission and Purpose; Non-Governmental Organizations; Motivation and Incentives; Health Industry; Zambia

Article

Motivated Inferences of Price and Quality in Healthcare Decisions

By: Emily Prinsloo, Kate Barasz and Peter A. Ubel

Policy makers have increasingly advocated for healthcare price transparency, whereby prices are made salient before services are rendered. While such policies may empower consumers, they also bring price to the forefront of healthcare choices as never before, with yet... View Details

Keywords: Healthcare; Price Transparency; Health Care and Treatment; Price; Quality; Perception; Consumer Behavior; Decisions; Insurance

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January 2006
Article

Corporate Tax Avoidance and High Powered Incentives

By: Mihir A. Desai and Dhammika Dharmapala

Keywords: Taxation; Motivation and Incentives

SSRN

fall 2002
Article

Distortion and Risk in Optimal Incentive Contracts

By: George P. Baker

Keywords: Risk and Uncertainty; Motivation and Incentives; Contracts

2009
Working Paper

Dishonest Deed, Clear Conscience: Self-Preservation through Moral Disengagement and Motivated Forgetting

By: Lisa L. Shu, Francesca Gino and Max H. Bazerman

People routinely engage in dishonest acts without feeling guilty about their behavior. When and why does this occur? Across four studies, people justified their dishonest deeds through moral disengagement and exhibited motivated forgetting of information that might... View Details

Keywords: Ethics; Moral Sensibility; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Behavior

2013
Article

Matching with Couples: Stability and Incentives in Large Markets

By: Fuhito Kojima, Parag A. Pathak and Alvin E. Roth

Accommodating couples has been a long-standing issue in the design of centralized labor market clearinghouses for doctors and psychologists, because couples view pairs of jobs as complements. A stable matching may not exist when couples are present. This article's main... View Details

Keywords: Market Design; Marketplace Matching; Balance and Stability; Jobs and Positions; Family and Family Relationships; Health Care and Treatment; Employment Industry; Health Industry