Does Management Matter? Evidence from India

Nicholas Bloom, Benn Eifert, Aprajit Mahajan, David McKenzie and John Roberts

No 16658, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: A long-standing question in social science is to what extent differences in management cause differences in firm performance. To investigate this we ran a management field experiment on large Indian textile firms. We provided free consulting on modern management practices to a randomly chosen set of treatment plants and compared their performance to the control plants. We find that adopting these management practices had three main effects. First, it raised average productivity by 11% through improved quality and efficiency and reduced inventory. Second, it increased decentralization of decision making, as better information flow enabled owners to delegate more decisions to middle managers. Third, it increased the use of computers, necessitated by the data collection and analysis involved in modern management. Since these practices were profitable this raises the question of why firms had not adopted these before. Our results suggest that informational barriers were a primary factor in explaining this lack of adoption. Modern management is a technology that diffuses slowly between firms, with many Indian firms initially unaware of its existence or impact. Since competition was limited by constraints on firm entry and growth, badly managed firms were not rapidly driven from the market.

JEL-codes: L2 M2 O14 O32 O33 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2011-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-eff and nep-exp
Note: EFG IO LS PR
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (69)

Published as Nicholas Bloom & Benn Eifert & Aprajit Mahajan & David McKenzie & John Roberts, 2013. "Does Management Matter? Evidence from India," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 128(1), pages 1-51.

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Related works:
Journal Article: Does Management Matter? Evidence from India (2013)
Working Paper: Does Management Matter? Evidence from India (2011)
Working Paper: Does management matter? Evidence from India (2011)
Working Paper: Does management matter ? evidence from India (2011)
Working Paper: Does Management Matter?: Evidence from India (2010)
Working Paper: Does management matter? Evidence from India (2010)
Working Paper: Does Management Matter? Evidence From India (2010)
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