嘉    宾： 侯   韵 助理教授 香港科技大学（广州）

主持人： 段伊戈 助理教授 上海交通大学安泰经济与管理学院

时    间：2025年11月3日（周一）14:00-15:30

地    点:  上海交通大学徐汇校区安泰经济与管理学院A407

内容简介：

Subject to causal ambiguity and the Dunning-Kruger effect, less able entrepreneurs are overplaced (overrate their relative ability) and struggle to learn their relative ability from past performance, and so persist in business despite low returns. We predict that benchmarking, which provides objective information about relative performance and best practices, can resolve overplacement. This, in turn, induces low performers to appreciate their true relative ability and exit. Further, conditional on continued operations, entrepreneurs adopt more suitable practices with sharpened self-evaluation of their relative ability. To test these predictions, we administered a randomized controlled trial among 194 Singapore food hawkers. Hawkers in both control and treatment groups were informed of their own performance. Also, treated hawkers were provided benchmark information. Within 15 months, 12.9 percent of treated hawkers, particularly low performers, ceased business, compared with 6.4 percent of control hawkers. The effect of benchmarking on the exit of low performers was more pronounced among those who lacked metacognitive ability, were less experienced, or faced fewer decision-making frictions. Conditional on continued operations, low performers adopted more incremental practices and improved their relative and absolute performance. The empirical findings are consistent with our theory of benchmarking.

演讲人简介：

Dr. Yun Hou is an Assistant Professor at the Information and Policy for Entrepreneurship (IPE) Thrust at HKUST(GZ). She received her Ph.D. in Management from the National University of Singapore and holds degrees in Economics and Management from Peking University. Her research focuses on innovation, entrepreneurship, and technology strategy. Her recent research examines how institutional environments (patent law, geopolitical tensions, and environmental regulations) affect innovation using quasi-experimental methods, and how entrepreneurs adjust to bias in experimental settings.