Back to issue
Cover of: Yes Men in Tournaments
Ingmar Nyman, Jason G. Cummins

Yes Men in Tournaments

Section: Articles
Volume 169 (2013) / Issue 4, pp. 621-659 (39)
Published 09.07.2018
DOI 10.1628/093245613X13806312325779
  • article PDF
  • available
  • 10.1628/093245613X13806312325779
Due to a system change, access problems and other issues may occur. We are working with urgency on a solution. We apologise for any inconvenience.
Summary
We study a rank-order tournament in which employees acquire and use private information for an investment decision. In this environment, competition can turn employees into yes men who make investment decisions that excessively agree with preconceived notions. The specter of yes-man behavior may drive the tournament incentive intensity and the employees' information-collection effort either to zero or above the first-best efficient levels. We also show that yes-man problems are alleviated by a stronger correlation between the employees' sources of uncertainty and by the use of individual compensation contracts rather than a tournament.