Drilldown Data Access Rates and Managerial Target Achievement

Despite the rapid growth in the availability of highly detailed performance information intended to support managers’ decision-making, practitioners and academics have debated whether greater managerial data usage translates into improved decision-making and performance. I provide evidence on this debate by using proprietary click-level data on the rate at which frontline managers at a large U.S. footwear and apparel retailer access different types of detailed data underlying the retailer’s top-level key performance indicators (“drilldown data”). I find results consistent with frontline managers accessing drilldown data to support their performance on related operational decisions and performance targets. However, contingency analyses suggest that accessing drilldown data is neither necessary nor sufficient for higher performance. Finally, I use survey data on District Managers’ (frontline managers’ superiors) focus on top-level key performance indicators to show that the interaction between the decision-supporting and supervisory roles of performance information depends on the type of information and how frontline managers and District Managers use it. Collectively, these results suggest that low-level managers can use performance information to support their decision-making and that performance information's decision-supporting and supervisory roles interact in multiple ways.