The main function of hierarchies is to coordinate activities within an organisation, but a hierarchical structure also provides work incentives, by offering the prospect of hierarchical mobility. An alternative way for organisations to motivate workers is through job design. In organisations...

Using linked employer-employee data for Finland we examine associations between job design and ten measures of worker wellbeing. In accordance with Karasek's (1979) model we find positive correlations between many aspects of worker wellbeing and job control. However, contrary to the model, job...

According to psychologists and neuroscientists, a key source of intrinsic motivation is learning. An economic model of this is presented. Learning may make work less onerous, or the employee may value it in and of itself. Multitasking generates learning: performing one task increases...

Employers use applicant signals to help solve an asymmetric information problem in organizations. In this paper, we examine the impact of validated Dark versus Light personality traits on incentivized behaviors important to organizations: task effort, honesty, and reciprocity. A second study...

The performance of a work team commonly depends on the effort exerted by the team members as well as on the division of tasks among them. However, when leaders assign tasks to team members, performance is usually not the only consideration. Favouritism, employees' seniority, employees'...

Using multilevel mixed effects ordered logistic models, this paper conducts an original investigation of the new management as a technology approach for all EU nations in a framework that explicitly recognizes worker representation while incorporating the notion of affective commitment. It is...

In an effort to better understand occupational segregation by gender, scholars have begun to examine gender differences in preferences for job characteristics. We contend that a critical job characteristic has been overlooked to date: meaning at work; and in particular, meaning at work induced...

We study physicians' migration intentions by undertaking a Discrete Choice Experiment with senior Italian medical students. Using the mixed logit models, we estimate how much income students are willing to forego for various job characteristics, including the job location. We find that future...

In a new model of work schedules, employers choose the number of working hours and either dictate the exact hours to be worked or delegate that decision to workers via flextime. Workers' preferences over schedules influence their productivities. An inverted-U-shaped hours-output profile arises;...

We show that task juggling, i.e., the spreading of effort across too many active projects, decreases the performance of workers, raising the chances of low throughput, long duration of projects and exploding backlogs. Individual speed of job completion cannot be explained only in terms of...