
- 05 Jan 2021
- Cold Call Podcast
Using Behavioral Science to Improve Well-Being for Social Workers
For child and family social workers, coping with the hardships of children and parents is part of the job. But that can cause a lot of stress. Is it possible for financially constrained organizations to improve social workers’ well-being using non-cash rewards, recognition, and other strategies from behavioral science? Assistant Professor Ashley Whillans describes the experience of Chief Executive Michael Sanders’ at the UK’s What Works Centre for Children’s Social Care, as he led a research program aimed at improving the morale of social workers in her case, “The What Works Centre: Using Behavioral Science to Improve Social Worker Well-being.” Open for comment; 0 Comment(s) posted.
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- 19 Sep 2017
- Working Paper Summaries
An Invitation to Market Design
Effective market design can improve liquidity, efficiency, and equity in markets. This paper illustrates best practices in market design through three examples: the design of medical residency matching programs, a scrip system to allocate food donations to food banks, and the recent “Incentive Auction” that reallocated wireless spectrum from television broadcasters to telecoms.
- 26 Oct 2009
- Lessons from the Classroom
The New Deal: Negotiauctions
Whether negotiating to purchase a company or a house, dealmaking is becoming more complex. Harvard Business School professor Guhan Subramanian sees a new form arising, part negotiation, part auction. Call it the negotiauction. Here's how to play the game. Key concepts include: In a negotiauction, the rules are never perfectly pinned down, which creates both opportunities and challenges. The three common negotiauction moves are set-up, rearranging, and shut-down. Negotiauctions help in the current economic downturn by providing a more nuanced mechanism and better outcome for both parties. Closed for comment; 0 Comment(s) posted.
- 07 Mar 2007
- Research & Ideas
How Do You Value a “Free” Customer?
Sometimes a valuable customer may be the person who never buys a thing. In a new research paper, Professor Sunil Gupta discusses how to assess the profitability of a customer in a networked setting—a "free" customer who nevertheless influences your bottom line. Key concepts include: In multi-sided markets, some customers contribute to a company's bottom line directly while others contribute indirect benefits, which are more difficult to calculate. Businesses must be able to assess the value of these "free" customers in order to efficiently allocate marketing and other expenses to grow the business, and to develop a more accurate estimate of firm value. Using a model for valuing networked customers, Gupta found that in an auction scenario, buyers and sellers had almost equal value even though sellers outnumbered buyers 4.6-to-1. Closed for comment; 0 Comment(s) posted.
Transaction Costs and the Duration of Contracts
When buyers transact with sellers, they select not only whom to transact with but also for how long. This paper develops a model of optimal contract duration arising from underlying supply costs and transaction costs. The model allows for the quantification of transaction costs, which are often unobserved, and the impact of these costs on welfare.