Motivating through Managing by Walking Around

Abstract

In this paper, we analyze the motivational effects of managing by walking around (MBWA), a management style that emphasizes managers’ unstructured visits to the rank and file of the company. We do so by conducting a field experiment in the retail division of a medium-sized bank located in Latin America. We find that branches increase their sales productivity by a significant ten percent in the window following the management visit, an effect that persists for at least a month after the event. Contrary to our expectations, we do not find that the incentive effect of the visit is stronger for those branches located further away from the bank’s headquarters.