Information, Technology, and Information Worker Productivity

Summary

A foundational ISR paper that econometrically evaluates information worker productivity at a midsize executive recruiting firm and asks whether the knowledge workers accessed through their electronic communication networks let them multitask more productively. The authors combine three micro-level datasets — direct observation of

125,000 emails over 10 months, accounting data on >1,300 projects over 5 years, and survey/interview data on IT skills and use — and estimate dynamic panel models of multitasking, knowledge networks, and productivity using system GMM.

Contribution

Two main findings: (1) more multitasking is associated with more project output but with diminishing marginal returns, and (2) recruiters whose contact networks carry heterogeneous knowledge are on average less productive but more productive when juggling diverse multitasking portfolios. The paper argues this is a generalisable method for measuring how IT-enabled networks shape information worker performance.

Method

Empirical panel-data study combining email traces, project accounting records, and survey data; dynamic panel data models with system GMM estimation.

Relevance to RISE

The intellectual ancestor for measuring information worker productivity in the IS tradition. RISE pipelines (agentic researchers, LLM coauthors) are the modern extension of "knowledge accessed through electronic networks" — the same instruments (traces × output records × context) and the same identification problems recur. A reference point for any RISE evaluation framework that aims to quantify researcher productivity, including catalog evaluation hubs like asta-bench.

Critique / open questions

Single-firm setting (an executive recruiting firm) limits external validity; the multitasking and network measures predate LLM-mediated collaboration, so the structural channels (information access, attention costs) may be only partially analogous.

Key quotes

"We econometrically evaluate information worker productivity at a midsize executive recruiting firm and assess whether the knowledge that workers accessed through their electronic communication networks enabled them to multitask more productively."

"More multitasking is associated with more project output, but diminishing marginal returns, and … recruiters whose network contacts have heterogeneous knowledge … are less productive on average but more productive when juggling diverse multitasking portfolios."