Tournament Incentive Heterogeneity by Worker Rank and Horizon

In Simple Words

Think of a contest where only the top runners on the track and those nearing the finish line run at top speed, while runners far behind or at the start of a long marathon pace themselves because the prize feels out of reach or too far off.

Research question

Rank-order promotion tournaments generate uneven productivity responses across an organization if low-performing workers or employees facing distant promotion horizons perceive winning as impossible or remote.

Participants

N = 1,830 to 1,966 Community Health Workers across 372 Peripheral Health Units in Sierra Leone, categorized by baseline supervisor-reported performance rank and supervisor retirement timeline.

Study Design

Heterogeneity analysis within a randomized field experiment, measuring worker productivity shifts across performance rank tiers (top 3 vs. lower) and supervisor retirement proximity (within 5 years vs. longer).

Results

Meritocratic promotions boosted household visits by 38% (+2.348 visits; p < 0.01) for high-ranked workers versus +0.965 for low-ranked workers, and by 45% (+3.476 visits; p < 0.01) for workers expecting a supervisor retirement within 5 years versus +1.260 for distant horizons.

Takeaway

Structure promotion tournaments with intermediate progression tiers or targeted incentives for workers outside immediate promotion eligibility windows to maintain broad-based workforce effort.

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Plain-English glossary

Original explanations, informed by the references below. Examples are illustrations, not data from the studies above. The research text stays unchanged.

Baseline

The starting measurements in a study. Researchers use these to compare what participants were like at the start with what happens later.

ExampleBefore a training programme starts, researchers measure workers’ earnings. That first measurement is the baseline.

GET-IT glossary · Baseline characteristics ↗Read more about baseline →

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