Teamwork in Contests

Abstract We study self-organized teams in dynamic contests. Using data from Kaggle, we document that teams outperform solo players, but few players choose to form teams. Every new team alters the composition of players, discouraging less productive solo players to make submissions. We estimate the structural parameters of a dynamic contest model, including the team formation and submission costs. We find that team formation incentives diminish with the number of teams, as do the incentives to make submissions. We empirically evaluate the productivity-discouragement tradeoff caused by teamwork and discuss implications for contest design, including facilitating teamwork and hosting open competitions.