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Are Experienced Managers Experts at Overcoming Coordination Failure?

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  • Cooper David J

    (Case Western Reserve University, david.cooper@case.edu)

Abstract

This paper studies experiments set in a corporate environment where a manager attempts to overcome a history of coordination failure by employees using either financial incentives or communication. I compare the choices of subject managers drawn from a standard undergraduate population with subject managers drawn from the executive MBA (EMBA) program at Case's Weatherhead School of Management. The EMBA subjects are a group of experienced, successful managers; all of the EMBA subjects have at least ten years of work experience, including at least five years in a supervisory role, and have average annual earnings in excess of $120,000. The EMBA subject managers are able to overcome a history of coordination failure significantly faster than the undergraduate subject managers. This superior performance is driven neither by differences in the financial incentives offered to the employees nor by use of an inherently different communications strategy. Instead, EMBA subject managers are significantly more likely to use the same "good" communication strategy as is identified for undergraduate subject managers through systematic coding of manager's messages to employees.

Suggested Citation

  • Cooper David J, 2006. "Are Experienced Managers Experts at Overcoming Coordination Failure?," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 6(2), pages 1-52, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:bpj:bejeap:v:advances.6:y:2006:i:2:n:6
    DOI: 10.2202/1538-0637.1479
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    Cited by:

    1. Waichman, Israel & Requate, Till & Siang, Ch'ng Kean, 2008. "Managers and Students Playing Cournot: Experimental Evidence from Malaysia," Economics Working Papers 2008-19, Christian-Albrechts-University of Kiel, Department of Economics.
    2. Giovanna Devetag & Andreas Ortmann, 2007. "When and why? A critical survey on coordination failure in the laboratory," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 10(3), pages 331-344, September.
    3. Ahn, T.K. & Ostrom, Elinor & Walker, James, 2011. "Reprint of: A common-pool resource experiment with postgraduate subjects from 41 countries," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(9), pages 1580-1589, July.
    4. David J. Cooper & Jordi Brandts, 2020. "Managerial Leadership, Truth-Telling, and Efficient Coordination," Working Papers 1211, Barcelona School of Economics.
    5. Ganglmair, Bernhard & Holcomb, Alex & Myung, Noah, 2016. "Cutthroats or comrades: Information sharing among competing fund managers," MPRA Paper 71506, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Sven Grüner & Ilia Khassine, 2022. "Is there a link between endowment inequality and deception? – an analysis of students and chess players," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 17(1), pages 1-18, January.
    7. Depositario, Dinah Pura T. & Nayga Jr., Rodolfo M. & Wu, Ximing & Laude, Tiffany P., 2009. "Should students be used as subjects in experimental auctions?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 102(2), pages 122-124, February.
    8. Edward Cartwright & Joris Gillet & Mark Van Vugt, 2013. "Leadership By Example In The Weak-Link Game," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 51(4), pages 2028-2043, October.
    9. Håkan J. Holm & Victor Nee & Sonja Opper, 2020. "Strategic decisions: behavioral differences between CEOs and others," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 23(1), pages 154-180, March.
    10. Stefania Bortolotti & Giovanna Devetag & Andreas Ortmann, 2009. "Exploring the effects of real effort in a weak-link experiment," CEEL Working Papers 0901, Cognitive and Experimental Economics Laboratory, Department of Economics, University of Trento, Italia.
    11. Jorge N Zumaeta, 2021. "Meta-Analysis of Seven Standard Experimental Paradigms Comparing Student to Non-student," Journal of Economics and Behavioral Studies, AMH International, vol. 13(2), pages 22-33.
    12. Waichman Israel & Requate Till & Siang Ch'ng Kean, 2010. "A Cournot Experiment with Managers and Students: Evidence from Germany and Malaysia," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 10(1), pages 1-17, April.
    13. Waichman, Israel & Requate, Till & Siang, Ch'ng Kean, 2010. "Pre-play communication in Cournot competition: An experiment with students and managers," Economics Working Papers 2010-09, Christian-Albrechts-University of Kiel, Department of Economics.
    14. Yoshio Kamijo & Hiroki Ozono & Kazumi Shimizu, 2016. "Overcoming coordination failure using a mechanism based on gradualism and endogeneity," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 19(1), pages 202-217, March.
    15. Ahn, T.K. & Ostrom, Elinor & Walker, James, 2010. "A common-pool resource experiment with postgraduate subjects from 41 countries," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(12), pages 2624-2633, October.
    16. Bouma, J.A. & Nguyen, Binh & van der Heijden, Eline & Dijk, J.J., 2018. "Analysing Group Contract Design Using a Lab and a Lab-in-the-Field Threshold Public Good Experiment," Discussion Paper 2018-049, Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research.
    17. List John A., 2007. "Field Experiments: A Bridge between Lab and Naturally Occurring Data," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 6(2), pages 1-47, April.
    18. Dietrichson, Jens & Gudmundsson, Jens & Jochem, Torsten, 2014. "Let's Talk It Over: Communication and Coordination in Teams," Working Papers 2014:2, Lund University, Department of Economics, revised 18 Apr 2018.
    19. Matt Marx & Bram Timmermans, 2017. "Hiring Molecules, Not Atoms: Comobility and Wages," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 28(6), pages 1115-1133, December.
    20. Yoshio Kamijo & Hiroki Ozono & Kazumi Shimizu, 2015. "A mechanism overcoming coordination failure based on gradualism and endogeneity," Working Papers SDES-2015-11, Kochi University of Technology, School of Economics and Management, revised Jan 2015.
    21. Englmaier, Florian & Grimm, Stefan & Grothe, Dominik & Schindler, David & Schudy, Simeon, 2021. "The Value of Leadership: Evidence from a Large-Scale Field Experiment," Other publications TiSEM 590def79-85b0-4d4a-aafa-f, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    22. Jetske A Bouma & T T Binh Nguyen & Eline van der Heijden & Justin J Dijk, 2020. "Analysing group contract design using a threshold public goods experiment," European Review of Agricultural Economics, Oxford University Press and the European Agricultural and Applied Economics Publications Foundation, vol. 47(3), pages 1250-1275.
    23. Dietrichson, Jens & Jochem, Torsten, 2014. "Organizational coordination and costly communication with boundedly rational agents," Comparative Institutional Analysis Working Paper Series 2014:1, Lund University, Comparative Institutional Analysis, School of Economics and Management.
    24. Waichman, Israel & Requate, Till & Siang, Ch’ng Kean, 2014. "Communication in Cournot competition: An experimental study," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 1-16.
    25. Yoshio Kamijo & Hiroki Ozono & Kazumi Shimizu, 2014. "A Mechanism That Overcomes Coordination Failure Based on Gradualism, Endogeneity, and Modification," Working Papers 1401, Waseda University, Faculty of Political Science and Economics.

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