Young professionals typically do not enter into life-long employment relations with a single firm. Therefore, future employers can learn about individuals' abilities from the observable facts regarding earlier work relations. We show that these informational spill-overs have profound...

Incentive theory predicts that contract terms should respond to differences in agents' productivities. Firms' practice of anonymous contracts thus appears puzzling. We show that such a one-size-fits-all approach can be reconciled with standard agency theory if careers are marked by frequent...

An essential ingredient in models of career concerns is ex ante uncertainty about an agent's type. This paper shows how career concerns can arise even in the absence of any such ex ante uncertainty, if the unobservable actions that an agent takes influence his future productivity. By...

In many economic situations several principals contract with the same agents sequentially. Asymmetric learning about agents' abilities provides the first principal with an informational advantage and has profound implications for the design of incentive contracts. We show that the principal...

Incentive theory predicts that contract terms should respond to differences in agents' productivities. Firms' practice of anonymous contracts thus appears puzzling. We show that such a "one-size-fits-all" approach can be reconciled with standard agency theory if careers are marked by frequent...

Labor turnover creates longer term career concerns incentives that motivate employees in addition to the short-term monetary incentives provided by the current employer. We analyze how these incentives interact and derive implications for the design of incentive contracts and organizational...