Na Zou

Team

Research Fellow at the Professorship for Economic Institutions, Innovation and East Asian Development

Empirical Study: Employee Well-Being

Goethe-University
Faculty 02, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration
Institute for Management and Micro-Economics
Professorship for Economic Institutions, Innovation and East Asian Development

Campus Bockenheim, Juridicum
Room 522 (5th floor)
Senckenberganlage 31
60325 Frankfurt/Main
GERMANY
Email: zou@wiwi.uni-frankfurt.de
Phone: +49 (0)152-1919-0270

Mailing address:
Goethe University
"Protecting the Weak" Project
Campus Bockenheim, Juridicum
Senckenberganlage 31
Postbox 56
60325 Frankfurt am Main
GERMANY

Consultation hours:
only by appointment

To the homepage of the professorship

Last updated Dec 2017

RESEARCH

Project related research

I am focusing on the case study of “employee wellbeing” in China. Some over two hundred million migrants clustered in the manufacturing and service sectors are disadvantaged in variety aspects, and numerous new professionals also experience a work-life imbalance. That employee well-being is classified as a weak interest in China is hardly contentious. Calls for protecting employees are arising. But how does employee well-being become a weak interest that need to be protected? Which actors (e.g. the communist party, employees or NGOs) are playing the most important role in defining and protecting the wellbeing? How does the existing institution can be effected/potentially be changed by the interaction between different actors in order to design a better functioning labor market? Those puzzles are the most interesting part that I am working with.

Other research interests

In addition to the project, I am interested in the innovative human resource management strategy and its effect on employees’ work performance and firm productivity. In particular, I am concerned with the senior-level managers’ involvement in incentivizing employees and how and to what extent better organizational practices could add value to the firm. Whether the business growth model should shift from emphasizing Research and Development to Recruitment and Development is of great interest to explore. Moreover, I am also interested in the institutional aspect in the labor market.

VITA

Employment history

Since 2017	Research assistant at the Chair for the Study of economic institutions, Innovation and East Asian Development
Oct 2013 - Jan 2014	Talent specialist in the Human Resource Department at Universum AB, Stockholm, Sweden

Academic background

Mar 2014 -	Doctoral candidate in Economics, Goethe University Frankfurt am Main
Aug 2012 - Sep 2013	M.A in Business and Economics, Lund University
Sep 2008 - Jul 2012	B.A. in Economics; B.A. in Law, Jiangxi University of Finance and Economics

Scholarships

2014 - 2016	Scholarship by the VolkswagenFoundation to work as a Phd candidate and researcher within the framework of the research project Protecting the "weak", research cluster employee wellbeing
Nov 2011	National Scholarship from the Ministry of Education, People’s Republic of China. This scholarship is awarded on the basis of academic merit, research capacity and moral quality
Oct 2011, Oct 2010, Oct 2009	Merit-based “Excellent Student Scholarship” from Jiangxi University of Finance and Economics

Memberships

Since Apr 2014

Interdisciplinary Centre for East Asian Studies (IZO)

TEACHING

Winter Term 2014/15

Institution and Innovation

PUBLICATIONS

2016	Do local government officials discriminate against migrant workers? A field experiment on mayors’ mailboxes in China” Working paper
Sep 2013	Job Satisfaction and its Determinants among Chinese Rural-to-urban Migrant Workers: http://www.lunduniversity.lu.se/lup/publication/4023742

TALKS

Talks at academic Conferences, Seminars, Workshops

June 29 – July 1, 2017	29th Annual Meeting of the Society for the Advancement of Socio-Economics (SASE), University Claude Bernard 1, Lyon, France: with Cornelia Storz and Tobias ten Brink): “China’s Innovative Rise and the Role of Public-Private Collaboration”
June 29 – July 1, 2017	29th Annual Meeting of the Society for the Advancement of Socio-Economics (SASE), University Claude Bernard 1, Lyon, France: “Government online forum for everyone? A field experiment on Chinese local bureaucrats and access to medical insurance”
March 8, 2017	5th Duisburg-Frankfurt Workshop “Institutionen in der Entwicklung Ostasiens, Goethe University Frankfurt: “Strategic thinking, networking and micro-entrepreneurs’ success”
Dec 1, 2016	Management and Microeconomics Brown Bag Seminar, Goethe University Frankfurt: “Who has a higher propensity of forming networks?”
Oct. 7 - 8, 2016	International conference “Protecting the Weak – Concepts and East Asian Evidence”, Lingnan University, Hong Kong: “Who has a higher propensity of forming networks?”
June 24 - 26, 2016	SASE 2016 Conference, University of California, Berkeley, June 24 - 26, 2016 at the session (organized by Markus Heckel and Ioan Trifu) "Protecting the Weak": Social Justice and Wellbeing in China and Japan: “Do local government officials discriminate against migrant workers? A field experiment in China”
March 1, 2016	Duisburg-Frankfurt Workshop: Institutions in East Asia, Duisburg University, Duisburg, Germany: “Do local government officials discriminate against migrant workers? A field experiment in China”
Feb 19, 2016	Ph.D. workshop of Isabelle Thireau “Normes sociales et légitimité en Chine contemporaine”, EHESS, Paris, France: “Do local government officials discriminate against migrant workers? A field experiment in China”
Oct. 30 - 31, 2015	2^nd Young Scholars’ Forum, organized by Goethe University Frankfurt, Fudan University (China) and the Confucius Institute Frankfurt:“Do Local Government Officials Discriminate against Migrant Workers? A Field Experiment on Mayors’ mailboxes in China”
July 2-4, 2015	SASE 27^th Annual Conference, London School of Economics: “Do high dismissal costs lead to more innovation? Evidence from OECD panel data”; „Time and risk preference in Japan“ (with Markus Heckel)
June 15-17, 2015	DRUID15 Conference “The Relevance of Innovation”, coorganized with Libera Università Internazionale degli Studi Sociali Guido Carli di Roma (LUISS):„Are flexible labor markets innovation-enhancing? Evidence from OECD panel data” (with Cornelia Storz)
April 02-03, 2015	STAJE Conference 2015, Stanford University: “Flexible labor markets and innovation -- A cross-country analysis”(with Cornelia Storz)
March 13, 2015	Duisburg-Frankfurt Workshop, Goethe University Frankfurt: “Risk preference, subjective wellbeing and consumption behavior, a cross-country comparison between China, Japan and the US” (with Markus Heckel) at
March 13, 2014	Duisburg-Frankfurt Workshop: Institutions in East Asia, Duisburg University, Duisburg, Germany; “Job Satisfaction and its Determinants among Chinese Rural-to-urban Migrant workers”