IGL database (beta)

Year Title Short summary Country Author
2024 Matching Firms and Scientists: Evidence from a Randomized Control Trial

Business-science collaboration is essential for fostering innovation and economic development, particularly in rapidly evolving sectors like AI and Energy Efficiency and Sustainability. We study how to enhance the collaboration between firms and scientists given persistent barriers such as information frictions, behavioral biases, and high transaction costs. To address existing challenges, the research investigates the potential of matchmaking interventions.

Avdeenko, A., Campos, F., Chandy, R., Iacovone, L., Kala, N.
2024 Enhancing SMEs’ Digital Innovation Capabilities: Experimental Evidence from a User Experience Design Challenge

Innovating product design is crucial for firms operating in the digital sector as it is closely linked with innovation capability and, therefore, with firm performance and productivity. In this paper, we run a randomized controlled trial to assess if participating in an open innovation initiative increases SMEs’ capability to design more competitive digital products. More specifically, the intervention aimed at increasing firms’ knowledge of the Design Sprint and their readiness to implement user-centered design techniques.

Azzolini, D., Doppio, N., Mion, L., Russo, I.Q., Tomelleri, A.
2024 Does subsidising business advice improve firm performance? Evidence from a large RCT

We evaluate the impact of the UK’s Growth Vouchers Programme, which offered subsidised business advice to 15,207 randomly selected small and medium size enterprises. Using administrative and survey data, we show that the programme increased turnover by 8.2% but only in the short-term and potentially at the expense of non-supported firms. We find that subsidised advice appears to improve firms’ capabilities and practices in a way that is consistent with the increase in turnover.

UK Nunez-Chaim, G., Overman, H.G., Riom, C.
2023 Evaluating the “Funneling” Approach to Support Firms

Entrepreneurs in developing countries face a series of diverse constraints to growth, including lack of access to business skills, markets, and finance. The binding constraints vary from firm to firm, implying that the returns to possible interventions are likely to be heterogeneous.

Anderson, S., Grover, A., Ubfal, D.
2023 Reducing Carbon Emissions while Boosting Growth: an Experiment with Turkish Manufacturing Firms

Understanding how to design policies to effectively reduce firm-level carbon emissions while minimizing impacts on economic growth is a question of central importance in the battle to mitigate climate change. The EU is proposing a Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) that will tax imports to better reflect their carbon content. This project evaluates three policies that provide firms with training and assistance obtaining loans with the goal of mitigating the impacts of CBAM on Turkish SMEs.

Atkin, D., Berman, A., Demir, B.
2023 On the Allocation and Impacts of Managerial Training

We study the allocation and productivity consequences of training production line supervisors in soft skills via a randomized controlled trial. Consistent with standard practice for training investments within firms, we asked middle managers – who sit above supervisors in the hierarchy – to nominate members of their supervisory team for training. Program access was randomized within these recommendation rankings. Highly recommended supervisors experienced no productivity gains; in contrast, less recommended supervisors’ productivity increased 12% relative to controls.

Adhvaryu, A., Murathanoglu, E., Nyshadham, A.
2023 The effects of business loans and technology support on the growth of U.S. online entrepreneurs

This study is focused on the relationship between borrowing constraints, access to cutting-edge technology and information about cutting-edge technology on the performance of U.S. online businesses. With the help of two large U.S. technology companies we will be able to randomize access to loans and free cloud computing credits (as well as information about the potential use of technology) to otherwise identical (generally small, but fast growing) firms, to see if they will have a causal impact on firm development.

Bloom, N., Codreanu, M.A.
2023 Improving Workplace Climate in Large Corporations: A Clustered Randomized Intervention

We evaluate the impact of a training program aimed at improving the relational atmosphere in the workplace. The program encourages prosocial behavior and the use of professional language, focusing primarily on leaders’ behavior and leader-subordinate interactions. We implement this program using a clustered randomized design involving over 3,000 headquarters employees of 20 large corporations in Turkey. We evaluate the program with respect to employee separation, pro- and antisocial behavior, the prevalence of support networks, and perceived workplace climate.

Alan, S., Corekcioglu, G., Sutter, M.
2023 The Causal Impact of Covid-19 Government-backed Loans on MSMEs Liquidity and Earnings

We conducted two randomized controlled trials (RCTs) to evaluate the impact of government-guaranteed loans offered by the Chilean and Colombian governments. The public funds of these programs greatly expanded following the start of the Covid-19 pandemic and offered loans to Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises to mitigate the negative impact of the shock. Through a collaboration with private banks, we launched two experiments which offered loans to a sub-set of the 10,072 Chilean and 3,079 Colombian small businesses that took part in our experiments.

Cerda, M., Gertler, P., Higgins, S., Montoya, A.M., Parrado, E., Undurraga, R.
2023 Information Constraints and Technology Efficiency: Field Experiments Benchmarking Firms Website Performance

This study examines the influence of information constraints on firms’ efficiency in using digital technologies, focusing on business websites. Through two natural field experiments in the UK, we provide firms with benchmarked performance information on their websites. The experimental designs enable us to assess the salience of the information provided and heterogeneity linked to prior experience and catch-up potential.

Adem, A., Kneller, R., Li, C.
2023 System-, teacher-, and student-level interventions for improving participation in online learning at scale in high schools

Many school systems across the globe turned to online education during the COVID-19 pandemic. This context differs significantly from the prepandemic situation in which massive open online courses attracted large numbers of voluntary learners who struggled with completion. Students who are provided online courses by their high schools also have their behavior determined by actions of their teachers and school system.

Asanov, I., Asanov, A.-M., Åstebro, T., Buenstorf, G., Crépon, B., McKenzie, D., Flores T., F.P., Mensmann, M., Schulte, M.
2023 The Impact of Peer-to-Peer Management Training on Collaboration and Workplace Outcomes

Effective workplace management plays a crucial role in determining employee performance, retention, and subsequently, overall firm performance. While conventional management strategies often emphasize hierarchical relationships, peer-to-peer management, or "managing across," represents a promising yet largely unexplored approach. This study aims to investigate the impact of peer-to-peer management training on various employee outcomes and identify the conditions under which the intervention proves most effective.

Adhvaryu, A., Nyshadham, A., Wu, H.X., Xu, H.
2023 Gender bias in funding evaluation: A randomized experiment

Gender differences in research funding exist, but bias evidence is elusive and findings are contradictory. Bias has multiple dimensions, but in evaluation processes, bias would be the outcome of the reviewers’ assessment. Evidence in observational approaches is often based either on outcome distributions or on modeling bias as the residual. Causal claims are usually mixed with simple statistical associations.

Cruz-Castro, L., Sanz-Menéndez, L.
2023 Evaluating the “Funneling” Approach to Support Firms

Entrepreneurs in developing countries face a series of diverse constraints to growth, including lack of access to business skills, markets, and finance. The binding constraints vary from firm to firm, implying that the returns to possible interventions are likely to be heterogeneous.

Anderson, S., Grover, A., Ubfal, D.
2023 Reducing Carbon Emissions while Boosting Growth: an Experiment with Turkish Manufacturing Firms

Understanding how to design policies to effectively reduce firm-level carbon emissions while minimizing impacts on economic growth is a question of central importance in the battle to mitigate climate change. The EU is proposing a Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) that will tax imports to better reflect their carbon content. This project evaluates three policies that provide firms with training and assistance obtaining loans with the goal of mitigating the impacts of CBAM on Turkish SMEs.

Atkin, D., Berman, A., Demir, B.
2023 Climate change framing and innovator attention: Evidence from an email field experiment

Drawing the attention of innovators to climate change is important for green innovation. We report an email field experiment with MIT using messages about the impact of climate change to invite innovators (SBIR grantees) to apply to a technology competition. We vary our messages on the time frame and scale of the human cost of climate change across scientifically valid scenarios. Innovator attention (clicks) is sensitive to climate change messaging. These changes in clicks also predict higher application rates.

Guzman, J., Oh, J.J., Sen, A.
2023 Impacts of adopting a new management practice: Operational Coaching™

Purpose

This article reports the results of a randomized field experiment that tested the effects of a new business intervention among managers of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in England.

Design/methodology/approach

Individual managers (learners) were randomly assigned in clusters (companies) to either an intervention group (265 learners; 40 SMEs) receiving a novel virtual, blended training program designed to stimulate a change in management behavior or a no-intervention group (118 learners; 22 SMEs).

Ashley-Timms, D., Ashley-Timms, L., Phillips, R., Tinelli, M.
2023 Chat Over Coffee? Diffusion of Agronomic Practices and Market Spillovers in Rwanda

Agricultural extension programs often train a few farmers and count on diffusion through social networks for the innovation to spread. However, if markets are imperfectly integrated, this may also inflict negative externalities. In a two-step experiment of an agronomy training program among Rwandan coffee farmers, we first randomize the concentration of trainees at the village level and then randomly select within each village. Knowledge increased, and yields were 6.7% higher for trained farmers.

Duflo, E., Keniston, D., Suri, T., Zipfel, C.
2023 The Impact of Peer-to-Peer Management Training on Collaboration and Workplace Outcomes

Effective workplace management plays a crucial role in determining employee performance, retention, and subsequently, overall firm performance. While conventional management strategies often emphasize hierarchical relationships, peer-to-peer management, or "managing across," represents a promising yet largely unexplored approach. This study aims to investigate the impact of peer-to-peer management training on various employee outcomes and identify the conditions under which the intervention proves most effective.

Adhvaryu, A., Nyshadham, A., Wu, H.X., Xu, H.
2023 Who Wants to Improve their Management? Evidence from a Failed Experiment (ESCoE DP 2023-22)

Structured management practices are robustly correlated with superior performance, but while some firms change practices quickly, wide dispersion of management quality persists. Uniquely, combining evidence from two novel business surveys and a failed management mentoring field experiment, we observe firms’ intentions to improve their management practices and firms’ subjective barriers to improving their management practices. We find clear evidence of positive selection into a free management mentoring scheme: the worst managed firms were the least likely to seek help.

Meng, C.C., Mizen, P., Riley, R., Schneebacher, J.
2023 Evaluating the “Funneling” Approach to Support Firms

Entrepreneurs in developing countries face a series of diverse constraints to growth, including lack of access to business skills, markets, and finance. The binding constraints vary from firm to firm, implying that the returns to possible interventions are likely to be heterogeneous.

Anderson, S., Grover, A., Ubfal, D.
2023 The Uneven Impact of Generative AI on Entrepreneurial Performance

There is a growing belief that scalable and low-cost AI assistance can improve firm decision-making and economic performance. However, running a business involves a myriad of open-ended problems, making it hard to generalize from recent studies showing that generative AI improves performance on well-definedwriting tasks. In our field experiment with 640 Kenyan entrepreneurs, we assessed the impact of AI-generated advice on small business revenues and profits.

Clarke, R.P., Delecourt, S., Holtz, D., Koning, R., Otis, N.G.
2023 Can Financial Incentives to Firms Improve Apprentice Training? Experimental Evidence from Ghana

We use a field experiment to test whether financial incentives can improve the quality of apprenticeship training. Trainers (firm owners) in the treatment group participated in a tournament incentive scheme where they received a payment based on their apprentices’ rank-order performance on a skills assessment. Trainers in the control group received a fixed payment based on their apprentices’ participation in the assessment. Performance on the assessment was higher in the treatment group.

Brown, G., Hardy, M., Mbiti, I., McCasland, J., Salcher, I.
2023 The Impact of Peer-to-Peer Management Training on Collaboration and Workplace Outcomes

Effective workplace management plays a crucial role in determining employee performance, retention, and subsequently, overall firm performance. While conventional management strategies often emphasize hierarchical relationships, peer-to-peer management, or "managing across," represents a promising yet largely unexplored approach. This study aims to investigate the impact of peer-to-peer management training on various employee outcomes and identify the conditions under which the intervention proves most effective.

Adhvaryu, A., Nyshadham, A., Wu, H.X., Xu, H.
2023 Productivity co-benefits of Energy Saving Technology

India is host to 63 million Micro, Small and Medium scale Enterprises (MSMEs), contributing to a large share of employment, industrial output as well as high volume of emissions per unit of output. Therefore, adoption of energy efficient (EE) technologies by MSMEs is crucial in improving not only their competitiveness through cost reduction but also worker wellbeing and productivity through improvements in the work environment. Enterprise owners most often do not internalize the benefits of the latter; like productivity gains due to reduction in exposure of workers to heat, pollution etc.

Adhvaryu, A., Dhanaraj, S., Gade, S., Nyshadham, A.
2023 Can Innovation Be Taught In Schools? Experimental Evidence From India

Innovation plays a pivotal role in fostering economic growth, yet there is a limited understanding of whether it can be taught. I conduct a randomized evaluation of an education program implemented by a state government and a nonprofit organization, providing an opportunity to 6,224 8th-grade students from disadvantaged backgrounds to develop frugal innovations for global and local problems. To assess students’ innovative ability, I created a novel scale with inputs from experienced inventors and used a lab-in-the-field game from experimental economics.

Gupta, S.
2023 Evaluating the “Funneling” Approach to Support Firms

Entrepreneurs in developing countries face a series of diverse constraints to growth, including lack of access to business skills, markets, and finance. The binding constraints vary from firm to firm, implying that the returns to possible interventions are likely to be heterogeneous.

Anderson, S., Grover, A., Ubfal, D.
2023 The Uneven Impact of Generative AI on Entrepreneurial Performance

There is a growing belief that scalable and low-cost AI assistance can improve firm decision-making and economic performance. However, running a business involves a myriad of open-ended problems, making it hard to generalize from recent studies showing that generative AI improves performance on well-definedwriting tasks. In our field experiment with 640 Kenyan entrepreneurs, we assessed the impact of AI-generated advice on small business revenues and profits.

Clarke, R.P., Delecourt, S., Holtz, D., Koning, R., Otis, N.G.
2023 Which Firms Gain from Digital Advertising? Evidence from a Field Experiment

Measuring the returns of advertising opportunities continues to be a challenge for many businesses. We design and run a field experiment in collaboration with Yelp across 18,294 firms in the restaurant industry to understand which types of businesses gain more from digital advertising. We randomly assign 7,209 restaurants to freely receive Yelp’s standard ads package for three months. The scale of the experiment gives us a unique opportunity to assess the heterogeneity in advertising effectiveness across a variety of business attributes.

Dai, W., Kim, H., Luca, M.
2023 Are Small Firms Labor Constrained? Experimental Evidence from Ghana

We report the results of a field experiment that randomly placed unemployed young people as apprentices with small firms in Ghana and included no cash subsidy to firms (or workers) beyond in-kind recruitment services. Treated firms experienced increases in firm size of approximately half a worker and firm profits of approximately 10 percent for each apprentice placement offered, documenting frictions to novice hiring.

Hardy, M., McCasland, J.

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