Publications

Educators

Much of what we believe about the best ways to compensate and motivate the sales force is based on theory and lab experiments. But in the past decade, researchers have been moving out of the lab and into the field, analyzing companies' sales and pay data, and... View Details

April 2002
Article

Internal Capital Markets and Firm-Level Compensation Incentives for Division Managers

By: Julie Wulf

Do multidivisional firms structure compensation contracts for division managers to mitigate incentive problems in their internal capital markets? I find evidence that compensation and investment incentives are substitutes: firms providing a stronger link to firm... View Details

Keywords: Capital Markets; Executive Compensation; Capital Budgeting; Motivation and Incentives; Profit; Decisions; Resource Allocation; Performance; Investment; Contracts

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

November 1976 (Revised November 1980)
Background Note

A Brief Note on Social Motives

By: John J. Gabarro

Briefly describes in management terms the three social motives: Need for achievement; need for power; need for affiliation. Also briefly reviews the implications of the work of David McClelland, David Winters, and others for motivation within organizational settings.... View Details

Keywords: Motivation and Incentives

Educators

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

December 1989
Article

LDC Debt: Forgiveness, Indexation, and Investment Incentives

By: K. A. Froot, D. Scharfstein and J. Stein

Keywords: Debt Reduction; Chapter 7; Default; Debt Restructuring; Borrowing and Debt

2002
Chapter

Political and Economic Incentives during an Anti-Corruption Crackdown

By: Rafael Di Tella and Ernesto S. Schargrodsky

Keywords: Crime and Corruption; Motivation and Incentives; Government and Politics; Economics

Article

Keep Your Weary Workers Engaged and Motivated

By: Boris Groysberg and Robin Abrahams

2002
Chapter

Pay for Performance: Motivation and Selection Effects

By: Felix Oberholzer-Gee and Iris Bohnet

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

Spring 2023
Article

Incentive Contract Design and Employee-Initiated Innovation: Evidence from the Field

By: Wei Cai, Susanna Gallani and Jee-Eun Shin

This study examines how the design of incentive contracts for tasks defined as workers’ official responsibilities (i.e., standard tasks) influences workers’ propensity to engage in employee-initiated innovation (EII). EII corresponds to innovation activities that are... View Details

Keywords: Employee-initiated Innovation; Contract Design; Rank-and-file; Extra-role Behaviors; Compensation and Benefits; Motivation and Incentives; Innovation and Management

Teaching Interest

Organizational Behavior

Each of us maintains a set of beliefs and general assumptions about humans and their behavior, and those assumptions form the foundation for our beliefs about what motivates individuals; about how individuals make decisions; and about the ways in which the... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Behavior; Leadership; Motivation And Incentives; Decision-making; Culture

04 Sep 2019
News

'I Know Why You Voted for Trump' and Other Motivation Misperceptions

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

1982
Article

The Economics of Matching: Stability and Incentives

By: Alvin E. Roth

Keywords: Balance and Stability; Motivation and Incentives; Economics

August 2014
Article

Incentives in a Stage-Gate Process

By: Raul O. Chao, Kenneth C. Lichtendahl and Yael Grushka-Cockayne

Many large organizations use a stage‐gate process to manage new product development projects. In a typical stage‐gate process project managers learn about potential ideas from research and exert effort in development while senior executives make intervening go/no‐go... View Details

Keywords: Stage-Gate Process; Production; Operations; Product Development; Innovation and Invention

2020
Working Paper

Recognition Incentives for Internal Crowdsourcing: A Field Experiment at NASA

By: Jana Gallus, Olivia S. Jung and Karim R. Lakhani

What might motivate employees to participate in internal crowdsourcing, a peer-based approach to innovation? Should organizations use incentives that are congruent with their established hierarchical structures, or should they use incentives that are aligned with the... View Details

Keywords: Online Platforms; Employee Engagement; Managerial Recognition; Innovation and Management; Employees; Motivation and Incentives

SSRN