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Work-progression and Productivity Toolkit: Increasing Work-advancement Opportunities for Female Workers and Improving Productivity in Bangladesh's Garment Industry

Last registered on December 20, 2017

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Work-progression and Productivity Toolkit: Increasing Work-advancement Opportunities for Female Workers and Improving Productivity in Bangladesh's Garment Industry
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0001843
Initial registration date
December 14, 2016

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published
December 14, 2016, 3:15 PM EST

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Last updated
December 20, 2017, 6:11 AM EST

Last updated is the most recent time when changes to the trial's registration were published.

Locations

Region

Primary Investigator

Affiliation
University of Oxford

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Affiliation
University of Oxford

Additional Trial Information

Status
On going
Start date
2016-11-29
End date
2018-03-31
Secondary IDs
Abstract
The Bangladeshi garment industry was instrumental in expanding women’s employment opportunities in the urban job market. However, the positions available to women at factories remain mostly limited to those at the machine-operator level. Building on findings from Macchiavello et al (2015) we implement a shorter and less costly training program for female operators that focuses on soft skills. Randomizing individual workers into three groups, we seek to determine whether soft skills training or hard skills training is a more effective and efficient means to promoting female advancement. We also investigate the effects of and interactions with a cross-cut training for higher-level factory management, which provides managers with tools for standardized worker evaluations and demonstrates the effectiveness of female supervision. In February 2017, Hannah Uckat added an additional component to the trial, which investigates the role of and the effects on women's bargaining power in the household.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Uckat, Hannah and Christopher Woodruff. 2017. "Work-progression and Productivity Toolkit: Increasing Work-advancement Opportunities for Female Workers and Improving Productivity in Bangladesh's Garment Industry." AEA RCT Registry. December 20. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.1843-3.0
Former Citation
Uckat, Hannah and Christopher Woodruff. 2017. "Work-progression and Productivity Toolkit: Increasing Work-advancement Opportunities for Female Workers and Improving Productivity in Bangladesh's Garment Industry." AEA RCT Registry. December 20. https://www.socialscienceregistry.org/trials/1843/history/24242
Sponsors & Partners

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Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
The Operator training programme consists of a soft skills component and a technical skills component.

The Management training programme includes training on standardized worker evaluations and demonstrations of the effectiveness of female supervisors.
Intervention Start Date
2016-12-15
Intervention End Date
2017-10-31

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
From daily production data: Line efficiency, alteration rates, rejection rates
From self-reported survey measures in the factory: Promotions, assessment of trainees by subordinates and superiors, technical skills, confidence and leadership (locus of control, self-efficacy, multi-factor leadership, emotional competence)
From administrative data: Promotions, absenteeism, job migration
For the additional component on women's bargaining power: household decision-making, household expenditures, aspirations, household communications and bargaining, social norms, control over assets, time use, domestic violence, willingness to pay to hide money.
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
For the Operator training programme, the trainees will be randomly allocated to three groups:
1) Soft skills only training
2) Soft skills and hard skills training
3) Control group

For the Management training, factories will be randomly allocated to two groups:
1) Treatment
2) Control
Experimental Design Details
Randomization Method
Operator training programme: Public lottery in the presence of trainees in each participating factory.

Management training programme: Private, stratified randomization with a pre-specified re-randomisation procedure, implemented on a computer.

For the household component, the analysis will take advantage of the individual-level randomisation for the operator training programme, and a discontinuity in the probability of an operator receiving a promotion created by the nomination procedure.
Randomization Unit
Operator training programme: individual

Management training programme: factory
Was the treatment clustered?
Yes

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
Operator training programme: average of 9 individuals in each of 28 factories

Management training programme: 28 factories

Household component: 9 trainees in 28 factories, in addition to 6 non-trained nominees in 28 factories. In most households, 2 individuals will be interviewed.
Sample size: planned number of observations
Operator training programme: 252 individuals Management training programme: 28 factories Household component: 840 individuals (trainees, nominees and household members)
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
Operator training programme:
1) Soft skills only training: 84 individuals
2) Soft skills and hard skills training: 84 individuals
3) Control group: 84 individuals

For the Management training, factories will be randomly allocated to two groups:
1) Treatment: 14 factories
2) Control: 14 factories
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
Oxford University, Department of Economics's Departmental Research Ethics Committee
IRB Approval Date
2017-05-15
IRB Approval Number
ECONCIA17-18-007 (for household component)
IRB Name
Oxford University, Department of Economics's Departmental Research Ethics Committee
IRB Approval Date
2017-02-13
IRB Approval Number
ECONCIA17-18-004 (for household component, pilot stage)
IRB Name
Oxford Department of International Development’s Departmental Research Ethics Committee
IRB Approval Date
2017-01-10
IRB Approval Number
ODID C1A 16-097 (for factory component)
IRB Name
Human Subjects Committee for Innovations for Poverty Action IRB-USA
IRB Approval Date
2016-10-19
IRB Approval Number
14220 (for factory and household component)
Analysis Plan

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Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
No
Data Collection Complete
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
No

Program Files

Program Files
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Reports & Other Materials