Skip to Main Content
HBS Home
  • About
  • Academic Programs
  • Alumni
  • Faculty & Research
  • Baker Library
  • Giving
  • Harvard Business Review
  • Initiatives
  • News
  • Recruit
  • Map / Directions
Faculty & Research
  • Faculty
  • Research
  • Featured Topics
  • Academic Units
  • …→
  • Harvard Business School→
  • Faculty & Research→
Publications
Publications
  • August 2020
  • Article
  • Quarterly Journal of Economics

Workplace Knowledge Flows

By: Jason Sandvik, Richard Saouma, Nathan Seegert and Christopher Stanton
  • Format:Print
ShareBar

Abstract

We conducted a field experiment in a sales firm to test whether improving knowledge flows between coworkers affects productivity. Our design allows us to compare different management practices and to isolate whether frictions to knowledge transmission primarily reside with knowledge seekers, knowledge providers, or both. We find large productivity gains from treatments that reduced frictions for knowledge seekers. Workers who were encouraged to seek advice from a randomly chosen partner during structured meetings had average sales gains exceeding 15%. These effects lasted at least 20 weeks after the experiment ended. Treatments intended to change knowledge providers’ willingness to share information, in the form of incentives tied to partners’ joint output, led to positive—but transitory—sales gains. Directing coworkers to share knowledge raised average productivity and reduced output dispersion between workers, highlighting the role that management practices play in generating spillovers inside the firm.

Keywords

Knowledge Sharing; Interpersonal Communication; Employees; Performance Productivity; Sales; Motivation and Incentives

Citation

Sandvik, Jason, Richard Saouma, Nathan Seegert, and Christopher Stanton. "Workplace Knowledge Flows." Quarterly Journal of Economics 135, no. 3 (August 2020): 1635–1680.
  • Find it at Harvard
  • Read Now

About The Author

Christopher T. Stanton

Entrepreneurial Management
→More Publications

More from the Authors

    • December 2022
    • Faculty Research

    Managing the Future of Work

    By: Christopher Stanton
    • December 2022
    • Faculty Research

    Freelancer, Ltd.

    By: Christopher Stanton, Karim R. Lakhani, Jin Hyun Paik and Nina Cohodes
    • December 2022
    • Faculty Research

    Freelancer, Ltd. Case Supplement

    By: Christopher Stanton, Karim R. Lakhani, Jin Hyun Paik and Nina Cohodes
More from the Authors
  • Managing the Future of Work By: Christopher Stanton
  • Freelancer, Ltd. By: Christopher Stanton, Karim R. Lakhani, Jin Hyun Paik and Nina Cohodes
  • Freelancer, Ltd. Case Supplement By: Christopher Stanton, Karim R. Lakhani, Jin Hyun Paik and Nina Cohodes
ǁ
Campus Map
Harvard Business School
Soldiers Field
Boston, MA 02163
→Map & Directions
→More Contact Information
  • Make a Gift
  • Site Map
  • Jobs
  • Harvard University
  • Trademarks
  • Policies
  • Accessibility
  • Digital Accessibility
Copyright © President & Fellows of Harvard College