Daniel Schliesmann

• Daniel A Levinthal and Daniel Schliesmann (2024), Cautious Exploitation: Learning and Search in Problems of Evaluation and Discovery, Organization Science. Abstract

  Underlying the macrophenomenon of organizational search lie two central mechanisms: belief updating and explicit strategies of exploration/exploitation. We find that slow learning with respect to belief updating, in conjunction with a strategy of exploration/exploitation heavily tilted toward exploitation, leads to an effective process of organizational adaptation in a wide variety of settings. This joint search strategy can be thought of as “cautious exploitation.” Belief updating proves to be a more effective catalyst to search, facilitating both the process of discovery of alternatives and persistence in favorable alternatives, than an explicit strategy of exploration. However, it is important to consider the boundary conditions around this finding. Problems of search differ in important respects: from settings that are primarily problems of discovery where the critical challenge is identifying a promising alternative, but its promise is self-evident once identified, to problems of evaluation where assessing the merit of alternatives that are identified is itself a challenge. We find that our conventional wisdom about the role of explicit strategies of exploration holds in settings that are primarily problems of discovery. However, when the evaluation of alternatives is problematic and assessed through experience with a given alternative, we find that the macrophenomenon of effective organizational search is best realized with slow rates of belief updating in conjunction with an explicit strategy of exploration/exploitation that is tilted to be highly exploitative.

Past Courses

• MGMT1010 - Intro To Management

  We all spend much of our lives in organizations. Most of us are born in organizations, educated in organizations, and work in organizations. Organizations emerge because individuals can't (or don't want to) accomplish their goals alone. Management is the art and science of helping individuals achieve their goals together. Managers in an organization determine where their organization is going and how it gets there. More formally, managers formulate strategies and implement those strategies. This course provides a framework for understanding the opportunities and challenges involved in formulating and implementing strategies by taking a "system" view of organizations,which means that we examine multiple aspects of how managers address their environments, strategy, structure, culture, tasks, people, and outputs, and how managerial decisions made in these various domains interrelate. The course will help you to understand and analyze how managers can formulate and implement strategies effectively. It will be particularly valuable if you are interested in management consulting, investment analysis, or entrepreneurship - but it will help you to better understand and be a more effective contributor to any organizations you join, whether they are large, established firms or startups. This course must be taken for a grade.

Knowledge @ Wharton

• The EV Trade War Alone Won’t Save American Manufacturing, Knowledge @ Wharton - 02/11/2025
• AI’s Impact on Productivity and Innovation | Daniel Rock, Knowledge @ Wharton - 02/11/2025
• Jeremy Siegel: How Tariffs Could Impact the U.S. Economy, Knowledge @ Wharton - 02/10/2025
• Why Accountability Matters in AI Development and Governance, Knowledge @ Wharton - 02/07/2025
• Embracing AI: Are You a Doomer, Gloomer, Zoomer, or Bloomer?, Knowledge @ Wharton - 02/04/2025
• Can Pride Make You Look Incompetent at Work?, Knowledge @ Wharton - 02/04/2025
• Transformative Tech: Innovating for the Underserved | Valentina Assenova, Knowledge @ Wharton - 02/04/2025
• As People Still Recover From the LA Wildfires, What Can Business Leaders Do to Help?, Knowledge @ Wharton - 02/04/2025
• The Economic Impact of Trump’s Tariffs, Knowledge @ Wharton - 02/03/2025
• Building a Brand: The Entrepreneurial Lessons Learned on the Road to Cirkul’s Success, Knowledge @ Wharton - 01/30/2025