Online PhD Defence Behrang Manouchehrabadi
In his dissertation 'Information, Communication and Organizational Behaviour’, Behrang Manouchehrabadi provided an explanation for the extensive use of documents in organizations and its effects on decision making and performance of organizations. Behrang Manouchehrabadi has defended his dissertation on Thursday, 19 November 2020 at 11:30h. His supervisors were Prof. George Hendrikse (RSM), Prof. Otto Swank (EUR). Other members of the Doctoral Committee were Dr Morteza Pourakbar (RSM), Dr. Josse Delfgaauw (EUR), and Dr. Jens Prüferi (Tilburg University).
About Behrang Manouchehrabadi
Behrang Manouchehrabadi was born in Tehran, Iran. He received his BSc and MSc degrees in Industrial Engineering from Iran. For five years, he worked as an operations and supply chain management consultant, before resuming his studies at ERIM, Erasmus University in 2013. He obtained a research master in Logistics in 2015. During his studies at Erasmus University, he became interested in Microeconomics and therefore, pursued a PhD in Business Economics at ERIM, Erasmus University. His research interests include organizational economics, game theory and information economics. His research findings have been presented in many international conferences including SIOE Annual Meeting (2018), and EMNET (2017, 2019). He has been involved in coordinating and teaching several courses, and supervising students at master and bachelor levels. Behrang is currently a Postdoctoral fellow at the Department of Operations, Rotterdam School of Management.
Thesis Abstract
Information is a key ingredient for decision making in organizations. Gathering, interpreting and sharing information requires an interdependent network of individuals, each one influencing and being influenced by the information. The thesis consists of three articles that study production, interpretation and transmission of information in various types of organizations and in different contexts. The first paper focuses on communication and decision making in heterogeneous partnerships. The paper explores the efficiency and viability of partnerships where partners are different in terms of their outside options and expertise. It analyses why heterogeneous partnerships exist only in certain types of industries. The second paper studies managerial overconfidence and its implication for the followers and organizational performance. The paper shows why overconfident managers are able to elicit a higher commitment from their followers and peers, compared to managers who are not overconfident. In addition, the paper shows how a manager’s reputational concern leads to escalation of commitment, i.e., continuing a failed course of action. The third paper studies intemporal transmission of information via documentation in a principal-agent setting. This paper provides an explanation for the extensive use of documents in organizations and its effects on decision making and performance of organizations.
