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• Article | Journal of Accounting Research | June 2019

  Fraud Allegations and Government Contracting

  Jonas Heese and Gerardo Pérez Cavazos

  This paper examines whether fraud allegations affect firms’ contracting with the government. Using a dataset of whistleblower allegations brought under the False Claims Act against firms accused of defrauding the government, we find that federal agencies do not reduce the total dollar volume of contracts with accused firms; however, they substitute approximately 14% of the harder-to-monitor cost-plus contracts for fixed-price contracts. This effect is concentrated in the procurement of services and explained by contract and service substitution. Lastly, we find that after the conclusion of the investigation, the government reduces the contract dollar volume by approximately 15% for cases that resulted in a settlement. Our findings indicate that contract-design changes are used to mitigate uncertainty in suppliers’ reputation.

  Keywords: whistleblower; Fraud Allegations; False Claims Act; Government Contracting; Risk Allocation; Government and Politics; Contracts; Crime and Corruption; Risk and Uncertainty; Business and Government Relations;

  Citation:

  Heese, Jonas, and Gerardo Pérez Cavazos. "Fraud Allegations and Government Contracting." Journal of Accounting Research 57, no. 3 (June 2019): 675–719.  View Details

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• Working Paper | HBS Working Paper Series | 2019

  Learning or Playing? The Effect of Gamified Training on Performance

  Ryan W. Buell, Wei Cai and Tatiana Sandino

  Gamified training is a novel management control system in which companies use gamification techniques to engage and motivate employees to learn. This study empirically examines the performance consequences of gamified training by conducting a field experiment in a professional services firm. We find that the main effect of adopting the gamified training platform on performance is not statistically significant at conventional levels. However, we also find that the effect is moderated by employee engagement, such that the gamified training platform improved performance in offices with high employee engagement and worsened performance in offices with low employee engagement. In offices with high levels of employee engagement—with above-median rates of employee retention and willingness to log onto the training platform—each additional minute of average platform engagement per employee led to an additional 0.28 new clients per month. In offices with below-median rates of employee retention and willingness to log onto the training platform, each additional minute of average platform engagement per employee resulted in 0.78 fewer new clients per month. Taken together, these results suggest that gamified training, which, in part, is intended to help engage and motivate employees to learn, may only yield performance benefits among those who are already highly engaged and motivated.

  Keywords: gamified training; Management Control Systems; employee engagement; Employees; Learning; Training; Motivation and Incentives; Performance;

  Citation:

  Buell, Ryan W., Wei Cai, and Tatiana Sandino. "Learning or Playing? The Effect of Gamified Training on Performance." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 19-101, March 2019.  View Details

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• Module Note | March 2019

  Designing Management Systems to Support Multiunit Growth

  Tatiana Sandino

  Citation:

  Sandino, Tatiana. "Designing Management Systems to Support Multiunit Growth." Harvard Business School Module Note 119-084, March 2019.  View Details

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