Pay for Performance – Evidence from a large discount retailer

Last registered on November 18, 2015

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Pay for Performance – Evidence from a large discount retailer
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0000961
Initial registration date
November 18, 2015

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
November 18, 2015, 9:53 AM EST

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

Locations

Region

Primary Investigator

Affiliation
Frankfurt School of Finance and Management

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Affiliation
University of Applied Science Neuss
PI Affiliation
University of Cologne

Additional Trial Information

Status
On going
Start date
2015-01-01
End date
2016-12-31
Secondary IDs
Abstract
Within a large retail discounter we monetarily incentivize a key performance variable, the normalized average receipt, for a randomly assigned set of middle (district) managers in one region. As a robustness check we used a different region in which we do almost the same procedure and intervention but without a monetary incentive. The middle management of this region receives a kick-off mail stating that the focus should be on the performance of the average receipt for the next months and they receive an additional feedback about their performance each month. This allows us to control whether a change in the performance is due to the monetary incentive or due to salience of the performance.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Manthei, Kathrin, Dirk Sliwka and Timo Vogelsang. 2015. "Pay for Performance – Evidence from a large discount retailer." AEA RCT Registry. November 18. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.961-1.0
Former Citation
Manthei, Kathrin, Dirk Sliwka and Timo Vogelsang. 2015. "Pay for Performance – Evidence from a large discount retailer." AEA RCT Registry. November 18. https://www.socialscienceregistry.org/trials/961/history/6078
Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
Intervention (Hidden)
Intervention Start Date
2015-11-02
Intervention End Date
2016-01-29

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
Among many: the change of the key performance indicator (avg. receipt), order behavior of managers, food expiration, FTEs, mystery shopping results, questionnaire
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
The intervention takes place in two regions of Germany. We randomly assign managers within each region to either the treatment (1) or control group (2) using the stratification method by Thomas Barrios (2013).

Region 1 (monetary incentive):

T1-1: Middle (district) management attended a kick-off event, receives a monthly notification concerning their performance of the key performance variable (average receipt normalized) and get €100 for each percentage point increase of this variable.
T1-2: Middle (district) management receives nothing except a notification that they will get a bonus for the increase of some other (at this point unknown) variable at a later stage (after this intervention).


Region 2 (salience):

T2-1: Middle (district) management receives a kick-off email and monthly notification concerning their performance of the key performance variable (average receipt normalized).
T2-2: Middle (district) management receives nothing.
Experimental Design Details
Randomization Method
Stratification method by Thomas Barrios (2013)
Randomization Unit
District Managers
Was the treatment clustered?
Yes

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
49
Sample size: planned number of observations
Bonus treatment: approx. 304 shop managers; Salience treatment: approx. 256 shop managers
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
(we are not sure about the exact number of shop managers at the stage of registration because the discounter wants to drop shops which do not exist for at least 3 years and shops which have been reconstructed this year. Unfortunately, we haven’t received this information yet)

Bonus treatment: 25 district managers
Salience treatment: 17 district managers
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
IRB Approval Date
IRB Approval Number

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

There is information in this trial unavailable to the public. Use the button below to request access.

Request Information

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