With unique attention to detail, BRCK has created a path-breaking solution to bring the digital world and state-of-the-art education material to those areas of the world that are yet to be connected to the fibre grid. An interview with CEO and founder of Kenya's renowned iHUB Erik Hersman allows for some insights into the ideal role division of diverse stakeholder groups to catalyze technology entrepreneurship in context such as Kenya.

Ventures

The remittance and international bank transfer market is ripe for serious disruption. BitPesa is taking charge and uses bitcoin to allow for seemingly instantenous money transfer across large distances. In an interview with CEO Elizabeth Rossiello she details her take on disruption and innovation when you are amongs the first movers.

Publications

The remarkable article Transcending Socialization published in Administrative Science Quarterly in 2011 takes a deep dive into the socialization process of becoming an investment bank manager and analyzes its impact on the managers' minds and bodies. With great attention to detail, this ethnography was able to show how managers' sought control over their bodies in order to carry out their demanding jobs. Yet, at some point in their careers (usually at the end of year 3) the body started to resist and show signs of immense fatigue, such as unbearable backpain. In the minds of the managers, the body then shifted from an object that can be disciplined to an antagonist preventing them to get their work done. The key ingredient to change and get back on track was a realization by the managers that they needed to surrender control and respect their body instead of fighting against it which in turn led to profound behaviorial change.

Publications

This research presents a cautionary tale: Transparency initiatives in firms - often times believed to enhance productivity, ease control and lead to overall higher performance outputs - turn out to give rise to strategically hidden behavior of workers.  With an ingenious two step research design that used findings from exploratory qualitative research to manipulate in a field experiment the work place of factory workers, a transparency paradox surfaced. Observability of workers’ actions can reduce rather than increase performance as concealing strategies create high efficiency costs. Introducing specifically designed private zones at work, counteract this phenomenon and showed immediate success by increasing output performance in one of China’s largest mobile phone plants.