Goal setting and monetary incentives : when large stakes are not enough
Gómez-Miñambres, Juan Carlos (Chapman University. Economic Science Institute)
Corgnet, Brice (Chapman University. George L. Argyros School of Business and Economics)
Hernán González, Roberto (Universidad de Granada)
Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. Departament d'Empresa

Imprint:	Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. Departament d'Economia de l'Empresa 2013
Description:	58 p.
Abstract:	The aim of this paper is to test the effectiveness of wage-irrelevant goal setting policies in a laboratory environment. In our design, managers can assign a goal to their workers by setting a certain level of performance on the work task. We establish our theoretical conjectures by developing a model where assigned goals act as reference points to workers' intrinsic motivation. Consistent with our model, we find that managers set goals which are challenging but attainable for an average-ability worker. Workers respond to these goals by increasing effort, performance and by decreasing on-the-job leisure activities with respect to the no-goal setting baseline. Finally, we study the interaction between goal setting and monetary rewards and find that goal setting is most effective when monetary incentives are strong. These results suggest that goal setting may produce intrinsic motivation and increase workers' performance beyond what is achieved using solely monetary incentives.
Rights:	Aquest document està subjecte a una llicència d'ús Creative Commons. Es permet la reproducció total o parcial, la distribució, i la comunicació pública de l'obra, sempre que no sigui amb finalitats comercials, i sempre que es reconegui l'autoria de l'obra original. No es permet la creació d'obres derivades.
Language:	Anglès
Series:	Departament d'Economia de l'Empresa. Documents de treball
Series:	Document de treball (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. Departament d'Economia de l'Empresa) ; 13/5
Document:	Working paper
Subject:	Treballadors ; Motivació

58 p, 986.3 KB

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Research literature > Working papers > Department of Business. Working papers