Abstract:

Idea creators may not always have the capacity or willingness to implement their own ideas. Instead, they may choose to delegate authority to implement an idea to a peer. A core assumption of the literature on delegation, however, is that in deciding whether or not to delegate, people possess information about those to whom they choose to entrust the implementation of their ideas. Yet in many contexts—such as online communities—it is not granted that idea creators possess this information. We conjecture that in such contexts where information on potential delegates’ competence and formal reporting structures is absent, people will base their decision to delegate or self-execute ideas on auxiliary information accumulated from prior experiences. Using data on 2,166 software development ideas from 436 idea creators in an online community developing open-source software, we investigate based on which experiences idea creators decide to delegate the implementation of an idea to a peer, and what the consequences of delegation are for idea implementation success.

General information:

Attendance to this seminar is possible by invitation only. Please send an e-mail to secbs-abs@uva.nl if your are interested in attending this seminar.