Knox and Stallings present at accounting research conference

Associate professors of accounting Brian Knox and Matt Stallings presented their paper "Do Big Prizes Attract Talent or Big Heads? The Role of Narcissism, Skill Level, and Relative Performance Information in Public and Private Tournament Choice," at the AAA Accounting Behavior and Organizations Research Conference, or ABO, in Indianapolis, Indiana.

Their research shows that big rewards attract the best talent, but only if people know they are actually the best. Without that clear data, talented people often stay away. Instead, these winner-take-all competitions attract narcissists, who chase the public status of a huge prize regardless of their actual skill.

For Knox and Stallings, presenting at the conference provided a platform for direct engagement with prominent scholars in the field. It's this peer element that really connected with Knox.

"It was fantastic to present at ABO. It's the premier conference for accounting experiments," Knox said. "We were able to share our work with the top minds in this research area. It was an honor to participate."

That engagement quickly translated into meaningful dialogue. Attendees were especially interested in how the study's findings apply to real-world business environments. The research suggests that increasing rewards for top-performing roles can unintentionally attract more narcissistic applicants; particularly in positions where skill is difficult to measure.

Reflecting on his own professional experience, Knox emphasized the delicate balance between confidence and overconfidence in competitive environments.

"Everyone has to strike a balance between having enough self-confidence to get things done and being so overconfident that it starts to distort reality. I've encountered plenty of people who haven't balanced that well. I'm not perfect at balancing it myself," Knox said. "Our study, in part, is about how common it is for the pay schedules we use for high-level positions to attract those who are overly confident."

That intersection between numbers and human behavior is exactly what continues to drive their work. Knox and Stallings are interested in expanding their research into the psychological dimensions of accounting, emphasizing that even the most quantitative decisions are ultimately filtered through human perception.

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