Sustaining operational productivity in the completion of repetitive tasks is critical to many organizations' success. Yet research points to two different work-design-related strategies for accomplishing this goal: <i>specialization</i> to capture the benefits of repetition and <i>variety</i> (i.e., working...

In many settings, firms rely on independent contractors, or freelancers, for the provision of certain services. The benefits of such relationships for both firms and workers are often understood in terms of increased flexibility. Less understood is the impact of freelancing on individual...

This paper examines learning curves in the health care setting to determine whether organizations achieve performance improvements from cumulative experience at different rates. Although extensive research has shown that cumulative experience leads to performance improvement across numerous...

Much of the literature on team learning views experience as a unidimensional concept captured by the cumulative production volume of, or the number of projects completed by, a team. Implicit in this approach is the assumption that teams are stable in their membership and internal organization....