핵심 개념
Ideators exhibit heterogeneous incentive preferences, often preferring non-cash incentives. Offering ideators a choice of incentives can enhance their creative performance, but the effectiveness depends on the market context and the degree of preference heterogeneity.
초록
The study explores ideators' incentive preferences and the effects of offering a choice of incentives in crowdsourcing contests.
Study 1 (field experiment):
- Quantifies ideators' incentive preferences in a non-profit crowdsourcing contest
- Finds that 49% of ideators prefer non-cash incentives over cash
- Provides preliminary evidence that offering a choice of incentives improves idea quality
Study 2 (online experiment):
- Validates the main effect of offering a choice on idea quality, but not on effort
- Finds that choice reduces the effectiveness of cash incentives on quality and amplifies the positive effect of non-cash incentives on effort
Study 3 (online experiment):
- Examines how market context (for-profit vs. non-profit) moderates the effect of incentives
- Shows that effort is generally lower in for-profit settings and even lower when combined with non-cash prizes
Study 4 (online experiment):
- Explores preference heterogeneity as a boundary condition
- Finds no interest in non-cash incentives and no benefit to offering a choice in a homogeneous ideator pool
Overall, the studies demonstrate that heterogeneity of ideators' preferences and the ability to satisfy diverse preferences with suitable incentive options is a critical boundary condition to realizing benefits from offering ideators a choice of incentives.
통계
Ideators in the non-profit contest submitted an average of 2.26 designs.
55% of ideators did not choose an incentive and were assigned the default cash prize.
Ideators who chose the non-cash incentive produced designs of higher quality than a random individual, while those who chose the cash prize produced designs of lower quality.
인용구
"Offering ideators a choice of incentives is an effective strategy for contest organizers to unlock additional value independent of the incentive offered."
"The effectiveness of incentives on both idea quality and effort is moderated by the form in which incentives are delivered such that choice decreases the effect of cash incentives on idea quality and increases the effect of non-cash incentives on effort."