Death of the salesman, but not the sales force : reputational entrepreneurship and the valuation of scientific achievement
Name
1051300074-MIT.pdf
Description
Full printable version
Size
8.52 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
2a72b2ec8308e192fff8ba8791f9684b
Author(s)
Wahlen, Jesse Michael
Advisor(s)
Ezra Zuckerman Sivan.
Alternative Title
Reputational entrepreneurship and the valuation of scientific achievement
Date Issued
2018
Publisher
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Abstract
Using citations as a measure of valuation and death as a shock that affects efforts to "sell" scientific work but not the quality of the work itself, we estimate the importance of "reputational entrepreneurship" on the valuation of life scientists' research. Insofar as reputational entrepreneurship is impactful, it is unclear whether the most effective reputational entrepreneurs are those selling their own work ("salesman") or those promoting the work of others (the "sales force"). While the salesman has more incentive to promote her work, the sales force is larger and likely to be seen as more credible. We find that by commemorating the death of a scientist, the sales force boosts the valuation of the deceased's work relative to what the salesman could have done had she remained alive. This suggests that while science seeks to divorce the researcher's identity from their work, scientists' identities nonetheless play an important role in determining scientific valuations.
Description
Thesis: S.M. in Management Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, 2018.
Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.
Includes bibliographical references (pages 44-47, 83).
Subjects
Sloan School of Management.
MIT Department
Sloan School of Management
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