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This paper aims to explore the design of management teams when the critical task facing individual managers is monitoring the performance of worker teams and producing performance measures under uncertain information environments.

The authors use a multi-agent LEN framework – linear contract, exponential utility and normal density – to model the incentive provision and organizational design.

The main lesson is that the use of performance measures under uncertainty is greatly affected by the potential for free-riding in the very monitoring activities which generate the measures to begin with. Accordingly, the value of having a management team, that is the incremental benefit of having a second manager, depends on the monitoring technology. Of particular importance are the potential free-riding in monitoring effort among multiple managers and synergies gained from having more than one manager, such as correlation among the performance measures produced or improvement due to splitting workers pool into separate groups for each manager to monitor separately.

The paper pushes this line of research further by explicitly modeling the endogenous process of signal generation within a rich economic environment. In this environment, number of workers being evaluated and number of managers who produce the signals are both endogenous. Furthermore, both workers and managers are subject to moral hazard problem. In particular, the managers suffer from potential free-riding problems but may benefit from synergistic forces due to team monitoring.

This paper aims to dismantle the idea that sex per se explains entrepreneurial outcomes and demonstrates the influence of a gendered motivation on forging and shaping new venture teams, which is a disruptive choice affecting the future of start-ups.

A two-level research model is validated on data from the Panel Study of Entrepreneurial Dynamics II (PSED II), with a system of simultaneous equations. First, if team features affect the performance of new ventures is tested; then, the study investigates determinants of team features with a focus on sex and motivation of nascent entrepreneurs.

Human capital (HC) in terms of education and experience of team members consistently explains venture evolution only when considering the larger team of affiliates. The HC gathered by nascent entrepreneurs is not because of the simplistic sex condition, but rather to a gendered motivation related to the inferior need of achievement of women.

Limitations of discretionary scoring assigned to items of the PSED II survey are present, but unavoidable when processing qualitative data.

Women need to be (culturally) educated on how to re-balance their personal motivation towards entrepreneurship by fostering their incentives for achievement. Political and educational programmes could trigger success in the creation of new businesses led by women.

This paper contributes to the literature on nascent entrepreneurship, focusing on the entrepreneurial teams in the initial phase of business creation, and provides the basis for further studies aimed at eradicating the stereotypes of gender roles that lead women to self-exclusion and organizational errors.

The purpose of this research is to explore the effects of supplier selection method on key procurement outcomes such as procurement lead time (PLT), supplier performance and buyer team size.

Data were collected from a sample of 124 archival contract records from the US Department of Defense. A multiple regression model and multivariate analysis of covariance/analysis of covariance models were used to test the effects of source selection method on pertinent procurement outcomes.

The trade-off (TO) source selection method increases PLT, as does the number of evaluation factors and the number of proposals received. Substantially larger sourcing teams are also associated with the TO source selection method. Nonetheless, the TO method results in better supplier performance.

TO source selections yield superior supplier performance than low-bidder methods. However, they are costly in terms of time and personnel. Any assessment of supplier value should consider not only the price premium for higher performance but also the transaction costs associated with the TO method.

Very little research addresses a buying team’s evaluation of supplier-offered value ex ante and whether that value assessment materializes into actual value-added supplier performance. Low bidder tactics are pervasive, but price (i.e. sacrifice) is only one component of value. Benefits from superior supplier performance may yield greater overall value. If value is critical to the buyer, a TO source selection method – versus a low-bidder approach – is the appropriate tool because of higher supplier performance ex post.

In this application briefing we describe an inductive learning activity designed for an executive-level leadership development session on leadership networks. We separated participants into nine teams of different sizes and varying access to collaborative networks among the teams. Each team was given the same word association challenge consisting of 25 problems and tasked with getting as many completed and correct as possible. Results showed those with access to collaborative networks were able to complete more of the word association tasks and had more correct word associations. Through this exercise we were able to demonstrate the importance of utilizing social networks for work-related purposes and illustrate the network concepts of isolates, bridges and brokers, and structural holes.

The purpose of this paper aims to investigate the relationship between the audit firm's ethical climate and workplace bullying perceived by trainee auditors in Chinese audit firms.

An Ethical Climate Questionnaire and a Negative Acts Questionnaire are adapted from the existing organization studies and business ethics literature to fit in the audit firm context and are administered in a survey on 205 trainee auditors with a four-month long work placement in audit firms. SPSS is used in statistical analyses and tests.

This study confirms that some but not all types of organizational ethical climate significantly affect the perceived workplace bullying in audit firms. The results of testing for the relations between workplace bullying and ethical climate after breaking down workplace bullying into the work-related and person-related bullying sub-categories provide some different conclusions. Besides the impacts of the ethical climate on workplace bullying, this paper also finds out that trainee auditor's gender, the leader–subordinate gender difference, firm size and audit engagement team size are more likely to affect the perception of one or more of the bullying categories in audit firms.

This study implies some guidance for the audit firms to establish healthy ethical climates that can help them to recruit, train and retain young skilled auditing professionals.

The findings of this study imply that a healthy ethical climate can help develop the audit profession and markets by deterring workplace bullying in audit firms.

This paper extends the organizational studies on the impact of the audit firm's organizational ethical climate on workplace bullying in the auditing profession. It also extends the gender roles in organization studies by stratifying the levels of workplace harassment.

The purpose of this paper is to review the empirical literature on the relationship between the characteristics of the top management teams (TMTs) and the performance of entrepreneurial firms.

A literature review was carried out on 33 empirical studies related to TMTs and performance through analyzing and summarizing the quantitative studies conducted in this area.

The results of the literature review show that the relationship between TMTs (demographics and heterogeneity) and the performance of entrepreneurial firms is not straightforward and further investigation is still needed in this area.

The author maps the theoretical and empirical research of TMT demographics and heterogeneity in relation to firms’ performance and possible moderators and mediators, which govern the relationship between TMT composition and firms’ performance.

The author presents a detailed future research agenda for the purpose of advancing the theoretical and empirical knowledge on TMT-performance links. The review provides a comprehensive picture of TMT-firms’ performance literature and what should be done to enrich the literature.

The purpose of this paper is to present The Build and Bond, an experiential exercise which engages student teams while they apply team dynamics, enhance team skills and foster team member interpersonal bonds.

During The Build and Bond, teams design and execute their own team-building activity. Specifically, teams set goals, generate ideas, make decisions, create a team-building activity, develop implementation plans and ultimately execute the activity. Finally, during an all-class debrief discussion, teams describe their team-building activities, connect their experiences to the learning objectives and reflect on how these lessons can be applied in future team experiences. Pretest and posttest surveys were used to determine if participants perceived increases in team performance and cohesion following The Build and Bond.

All teams reported that their activity added value, was preferred over an instructor-assigned team-building activity and improved team states. Findings from t-tests supported an improvement in team performance and cohesion.

The Build and Bond is designed to help students feel more equipped to communicate, have fun and work interdependently with current and future team members.

Teams design the team-building activity themselves, so members are often more interested in participating and engaging during the team-building activity.

This paper aims to provide instructors with a hands-on engaging and experiential class activity designed to teach undergraduate and graduate students about different organizational structures in management courses. Through this exercise, students will be able to self-identify the challenges and strengths of working under contrasting organizational structures.

Split into two (or four) teams, students construct origami animals based on their team’s organizational structure, using both mechanistic and organic structures to create a zoo based on a set of instructions and boundary conditions. Materials required include origami paper, markers, printed instructions, origami animal instructions, and role title cards for each student. The exercise takes approximately 30–45 min, including debriefing discussion. All materials/instructions needed are included with this paper (except origami paper and markers).

Through this exercise, students internalize the challenges and strengths of working in organizations with contrasting structures. The debrief discussion will help solidify student understanding of what the day to day experience of working in different organizational structures might look like, the pros and cons of different structures, and what type of employees or industries might thrive under different structures.

This paper is being submitted for the “Special Issue Call for Papers: Modern Day Experiential Exercises.”

This activity allows students to draw their own conclusions about organizational structure and to engage in a fruitful discussion about what working at different types of organizations looks like on a day-to-day basis.

This activity allows students to strengthen their skills in communication, teamwork, and leadership by having them work in teams to complete a challenging, competitive task.

While teaching organizational structure in management courses has traditionally been limited to traditional forms of instruction such as lecturing and reviewing different organizational charts, this activity gives students a fun competitive in-class activity in which they practice working as a part of contrasting organizational structures to see what type of structure they might thrive in.