Many strategic interactions in the real world take place among delegates empowered to act on behalf of others. Although there may be a multitude of reasons why delegation arises in reality, one intriguing possibility is that it yields a strategic advantage to the delegating party. In the case...

When appointing a representative in negotiations, the principal can offer his agent a contract that promises a percentage of the bargaining result, and a bonus payment (or penalty) if bargaining fails. Conventional wisdom of contract theory seems to suggest that the share should be as great as...

We analyze the impact of entrepreneurship as an outside option on compensation contracts between a principal and an agent with bargaining power. In the first stage the parties bargain over the base wage and the profit share. In the second stage the principal determines the capital investment and...

We study the optimal management of evolving hierarchies, which abound in real-life phenomena. An initiator invests into finding a subordinate, who will bring revenues to the joint venture and who will invest herself into finding another subordinate, and so on. The higher the individual...