Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/93755 
Year of Publication: 
2013
Series/Report no.: 
SFB/TR 15 Discussion Paper No. 451
Publisher: 
Sonderforschungsbereich/Transregio 15 - Governance and the Efficiency of Economic Systems (GESY), München
Abstract: 
We conducted a field experiment in a controlled work environment to investigate the effect of motivational talk and its interaction with monetary incentives. We find that motivational talk significantly improves performance only when accompanied by performance pay. Moreover, performance pay slightly reduces performance unless it is accompanied by motivational talk. These effects also carry over to the quality of work. Performance pay alone leads to more mistakes. Adding motivational talk makes the difference. In treatments with performance pay, motivational talk increases output by about 20 percent and reduces the ratio of mistakes by more than 40 percent.
Subjects: 
Verbal Motivation
Performance Pay
Field Experiment
JEL: 
C93
M52
J33
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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