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- Article
The Conversational Circumplex: Identifying, Prioritizing, and Pursuing Informational and Relational Motives in Conversation
By: Michael Yeomans, Maurice E. Schweitzer and Alison Wood Brooks
The meaning of success in conversation depends on people’s goals. Often, individuals pursue multiple goals simultaneously, such as establishing shared understanding, making a favorable impression, and persuading a conversation partner. In this article, we introduce a...
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- October 2021
- Article
Communicating Resource Scarcity and Interpersonal Connection
By: Grant E. Donnelly, Anne V. Wilson, Ashley V. Whillans and Michael I. Norton
Consumers often cite insufficient time or money as an excuse for rejecting social invitations. We explore the effectiveness of these excuses in preserving interpersonal relationships. Six studies—including perceptions of couples planning their wedding—demonstrate that...
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- Article
Emotional Acknowledgment: How Verbalizing Others' Emotions Fosters Interpersonal Trust
By: Alisa Yu, Justin M. Berg and Julian Zlatev
People often respond to others’ emotions using verbal acknowledgment (e.g., “You seem upset”). Yet, little is known about the relational benefits and risks of acknowledging others’ emotions in the workplace. We draw upon Costly Signaling Theory to posit how emotional...
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- May 2021
- Article
Making Doctors Effective Managers and Leaders: A Matter of Health and Well-Being
By: Lisa Rotenstein, Robert S. Huckman and Christine K. Cassel
The COVID-19 crisis has forced physicians to make daily decisions that require knowledge and skills they did not acquire as part of their biomedical training. Physicians are being called upon to be both managers—able to set processes and structures—and leaders—capable...
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- Article
Conversational Receptiveness: Expressing Engagement with Opposing Views
By: M. Yeomans, J. Minson, H. Collins, H. Chen and F. Gino
We examine “conversational receptiveness”—the use of language to communicate one’s willingness to thoughtfully engage with opposing views. We develop an interpretable machine-learning algorithm to identify the linguistic profile of receptiveness (Studies 1A-B). We then...
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- March 2020
- Technical Note
Influencer Marketing
By: Jill Avery and Ayelet Israeli
Despite a heavy barrage of advertising, most consumers declare that their purchases are most influenced by the experiences, advice, and recommendations of others, and not by marketers. Interpersonal communication between and among consumers serves as a potent path for...
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- September 2019
- Article
The Interpersonal Costs of Dishonesty: How Dishonest Behavior Reduces Individuals' Ability to Read Others' Emotions
By: J.J. Lee, H. Hardin, B. Parmar and F. Gino
In this research, we examine the unintended consequences of dishonest behavior for one’s interpersonal abilities and subsequent ethical behavior. Specifically, we unpack how dishonest conduct can reduce one’s generalized empathic accuracy—the ability to accurately read...
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- July 2019
- Article
The Gravitational Pull of Expressing Passion: When and How Expressing Passion Elicits Status Conferral and Support from Others
By: Jon M. Jachimowicz, Christopher To, Shira Agasi, Stéphane Côté and Adam D. Galinsky
Prior research attributes the positive effects of passion on professional success to intrapersonal characteristics. We propose that interpersonal processes are also critical because observers confer status on and support those who express passion. These interpersonal...
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- April 2019
- Article
Mitigating Malicious Envy: Why Successful Individuals Should Reveal Their Failures
People often feel malicious envy, a destructive interpersonal emotion, when they compare themselves to successful peers. Across three online experiments and a field experiment of entrepreneurs, we identify an interpersonal strategy that can mitigate feelings of...
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- 2022
- Working Paper
Mitigating the Negative Effects of Customer Anxiety Through Access to Human Contact
By: Michelle A. Shell and Ryan W. Buell
It is a well-established result in social psychology that when people feel anxious, they seek advice from others. However, increasingly companies that operate in high-anxiety settings (like financial services, health care, and education) are deploying self-service...
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- February 2019
- Article
Pettiness in Social Exchange
By: Tami Kim, Ting Zhang and Michael I. Norton
We identify and document a novel construct—pettiness, or intentional attentiveness to trivial details—and examine its (negative) implications in interpersonal relationships and social exchange. Seven studies show that pettiness manifests across different types of...
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- Article
From Orientation to Behavior: The Interplay Between Learning Orientation, Open-mindedness, and Psychological Safety in Team Learning
By: Jean-François Harvey, Kevin J. Johnson, Kathryn S. Roloff and Amy C. Edmondson
Do teams with motivation to learn actually engage in the behaviors that produce learning? Though team learning orientation has been found to be positively related to team learning, we know little about how and when it actually fosters team learning. It is obviously not...
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- 2018
- Working Paper
Status Inconsistency: Variance in One's Status Across Groups Harms Well-being but Improves Perspective-taking
By: Catarina Fernandes and Alison Wood Brooks
Most people belong to many different groups. While some people experience consistently high or low status across all of their groups, others experience wildly different levels of status in each group. In this research, we examine how status inconsistency – the degree...
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- March 2015
- Case
Tim Keller at Katzenbach Partners LLC (A) (Abridged)
By: Boris Groysberg and James Weber
Tracks the first six months of a recent MBA grad, Tim Keller, at Katzenbach Partners, a boutique consulting firm focused on organizational change and strategy. Covers how Keller initially struggles with his assignment and ends with a question of whether or not he...
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Keywords:
Interpersonal Relations;
Organization Behavior;
Superior ＆ Subordinate;
Managing Projects;
Informal Organization;
Consulting;
Professional Services;
Leadership;
Work-Life Balance;
Decision Choices and Conditions;
Organizations;
Rank and Position;
Product Development;
Service Industry;
Consulting Industry
- September 2014 (Revised January 2015)
- Module Note
Building Effective Working Relationships
This note introduces a framework for deliberately building effective interpersonal relationships. First, we will define the necessary attributes of these relationships. Next, we will discuss common barriers to effectiveness. Lastly, we will provide tools to build and...
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- June 2014
- Technical Note
A Note on Seeking, Receiving, and Giving Advice
By: David A. Garvin and Joshua D. Margolis
This note examines the processes of seeking, receiving, and giving advice by drawing on both academic research and the lessons of skilled practitioners. It begins with a discussion of the potential benefits and costs of advice-seeking and advice-giving. The note then...
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- September 2013 (Revised August 2015)
- Background Note
Leadership and Teaming
By: Ethan Bernstein
Small differences in the leadership of teams can have large consequences for the success of their efforts. Many initiatives fail not because of a fatal error in judgment or insufficient ideas, knowledge, motivation, or capabilities to deliver a solution. They fail...
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Keywords:
Teams;
Teaming;
Leadership And Managing People;
Leadership;
Team Effectiveness;
Team Performance;
Team Design;
Team Leadership;
Teamwork;
Team Process;
Team Function;
Team Launch;
60/30/10 Rule;
Team Boundary;
Distribution Of Leadership Authority;
Self-Managed Teams;
Virtual Teams;
Unbounded Teams;
Acts Of Leadership;
Execution Teams;
Decision Making Teams;
Creativity Teams;
Team Size;
Task Design;
Team Timeline;
Team Roles;
Team Representation;
Diversity;
Team Familiarity;
Collective Intelligence;
Team Stages Of Development;
Team Coaching;
Performance Pressure;
X-Teams;
Team Focus;
Interaction;
Management Teams;
Managerial Roles;
Management Systems;
Management Style;
Management Skills;
Management Practices and Processes;
Organizational Design;
Organizational Structure;
Performance Effectiveness;
Performance Efficiency;
Performance Productivity;
Groups and Teams;
Networks;
Social Psychology;
Behavior;
Conflict and Resolution;
Creativity;
Social and Collaborative Networks;
Satisfaction;
Prejudice and Bias;
Power and Influence;
Personal Characteristics;
Familiarity;
Cognition and Thinking;
Attitudes;
Projects;
Organizational Culture;
Organizational Change and Adaptation;
Leadership Development;
Leadership Style;
Leading Change;
Knowledge Use and Leverage;
Knowledge Sharing;
Collaborative Innovation and Invention;
Innovation and Management;
Innovation Leadership;
Design;
Interpersonal Communication;
Public Relations Industry;
Public Relations Industry;
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Asia;
North and Central America;
South America;
Atlantic Ocean;
Central Asia;
Europe;
Latin America;
Middle East;
Oceania;
West Indies
- September–October 2013
- Article
Discretion Within Constraint: Homophily and Structure in a Formal Organization
By: Adam M. Kleinbaum, Toby E. Stuart and Michael Tushman
Homophily in social relations results from both individual preferences and selective opportunities for interaction, but how these two mechanisms interact in large, contemporary organizations is not well understood. We argue that organizational structures and geography...
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- June 2012
- Article
The Transparency Paradox: A Role for Privacy in Organizational Learning and Operational Control
Using data from embedded participant-observers and a field experiment at the second largest mobile phone factory in the world, located in China, I theorize and test the implications of transparent organizational design on workers' productivity and organizational...
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Keywords:
Transparency;
Privacy;
Organizational Learning;
Operational Control;
Organizational Performance;
Chinese Manufacturing;
Field Experiment;
Rights;
Interpersonal Communication;
Management Practices and Processes;
Ethics;
Corporate Disclosure;
Performance Productivity;
Boundaries;
Organizations;
Social and Collaborative Networks;
Labor and Management Relations;
Power and Influence;
Manufacturing Industry;
China
- Article
The Persuasive 'Power' of Stigma?
By: Michael I. Norton, Elizabeth W. Dunn, Dana R. Carney and Dan Ariely
We predicted that able-bodied individuals and white Americans would have a difficult time saying no to persuasive appeals offered by disabled individuals and black Americans, due to their desire to make such interactions proceed smoothly. In two experiments, we show...
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