Seminars

Abstract: This study explores effective strategies for enhancing remote employees' productivity outside of conventional office settings. Through an online experiment with gig economy workers, we investigate the potential of advice-giving as a performance enhancer. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three experimental conditions - baseline, advising-others, or self-advising-and engaged in a real-effort task that required balancing the costs and benefits of exerted effort. The findings reveal that self-advising significantly boosts performance by 10%, an effect size nearly double that of advising-others, a widely recognized method for performance enhancement (Eskreis-Winkler et al., 2018, 2019). Notably, this treatment effect comes primarily from improving the performance of workers in the lower half by almost 28%. We examine potential mechanisms underlying the effects, providing evidence that a rise in self-confidence is associated with subsequent performance improvement. These results underscore the efficacy of self-advising as a potent instrument for elevating worker confidence and productivity, offering valuable insights for managers and policymakers in the evolving employment landscape.