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New research on interpersonal communication from Harvard Business School faculty on issues including how to be a better listener, why dominating leaders kill teams, and strategies for making concessions.
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How to Live Happier in 2023: Diversify Your Social Circle

by Michael Blanding

People need all kinds of relationships to thrive: partners, acquaintances, colleagues, and family. Research by Michael Norton and Alison Wood Brooks offers new reasons to pick up the phone and reconnect with that old friend from home.

Feeling Separation Anxiety at Your Startup? 5 Tips to Soothe These Growing Pains

by Julia Austin

As startups mature and introduce more managers, early employees may lose the easy closeness they once had with founders. However, with transparency and healthy boundaries, entrepreneurs can help employees weather this transition and build trust, says Julia Austin.

All Those Zoom Meetings May Boost Connection and Curb Loneliness

by Michael Blanding

Zoom fatigue became a thing during the height of the pandemic, but research by Amit Goldenberg shows how virtual interactions can provide a salve for isolation. What does this mean for remote and hybrid workplaces?

Extroverts, Your Colleagues Wish You Would Just Shut Up and Listen

by Pamela Reynolds

Extroverts may be the life of the party, but at work, they're often viewed as phony and self-centered, says research by Julian Zlatev and colleagues. Here's how extroverts can show others that they're listening, without muting themselves.

Information Avoidance and Image Concerns

by Christine L. Exley and Judd B. Kessler

People avoid information that might compel them to behave more generously. While many people avoid information due to concerns about their self-image, there is a substantial role for other reasons, such as inattention and confusion.

Employee Performance vs. Company Values: A Manager’s Dilemma

Re: Nitin Nohria

The Cold Call podcast celebrate its five-year anniversary with a classic case study. Harvard Business School Dean Nitin Nohria discusses the dilemma of how to treat a brilliant individual performer who can't work with colleagues. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

How Leaders Can Navigate Politicized Conversations and Inspire Collaboration

by Kristen Senz

Francesca Gino discusses the psychology of conversation in politicized workplaces and how managers can improve their conversation styles to create high-quality collaboration. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

Love in the Office Is Wonderful. Except for CEOs.

by Regina Herzlinger

Finding love among your office colleagues can be a wonderful thing, and not inevitably career ending. Unless, of course, you are the CEO. Advice to the corporate lovelorn from Regina Herzlinger. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

Fostering Perceptions of Authenticity via Sensitive Self-Disclosure

by Li Jiang, Maryam Kouchaki, Francesca Gino, Reihane Boghrati, and Leslie John

By making sensitive self-disclosures, leaders can enhance how authentic their followers perceive them to be, leading to positive interpersonal outcomes and potentially organizational ones as well. Aside from the obvious costs of disclosing weaknesses, leaders may also reap surprising benefits from doing so.

Engineering Serendipity: The Role of Cognitive Similarity in Knowledge Sharing and Knowledge Production

by Jacqueline N. Lane, Ina Ganguli, Patrick Gaule, Eva C. Guinan, and Karim R. Lakhani

By creating opportunities for cross-disciplinary scientists to meet and talk as part of a natural field experiment, this study analyzes and finds evidence for a systematic relationship between knowledge sharing and knowledge production in the sciences. Findings may extend to similar types of cross-disciplinary knowledge-sharing opportunities in other settings.

How Does a Company like Boeing Respond to Intense Competitive Pressure?

by James Heskett

SUMMING UP: Playing out in real time, Boeing's misguided responses to competitive pressure illustrate organizational "gaps" suffered by many organizations. James Heskett's readers discuss solutions. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

How a New Leader Broke Through a Culture of Accuse, Blame, and Criticize

Re: Amy C. Edmondson

Children’s Hospital & Clinics COO Julie Morath sets out to change the culture by instituting a policy of blameless reporting, which encourages employees to report anything that goes wrong or seems substandard, without fear of reprisal. Professor Amy Edmondson discusses getting an organization into the “High Performance Zone.” Open for comment; 0 Comments.

How To Ask Better Questions

by Kristen Senz

To make the best decisions, managers must ask the right questions. This collection of past studies by Harvard Business School researchers will help you gather the critical information needed to prepare for action. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

Mitigating the Negative Effects of Customer Anxiety Through Access to Human Contact

by Michelle A. Shell and Ryan W. Buell

Firms increasingly deploy self-service technologies (SSTs) to manage customer interfaces that are inherently stressful. For example, patients may be asked to use kiosks to check themselves into hospitals. This study finds that customer anxiety during SST transactions can reduce customers’ trust in the service provider. Operational design choices may help.

Gender Stereotypes in Deliberation and Team Decisions

by Katherine B. Coffman, Clio Bryant Flikkema, and Olga Shurchkov

Professional success requires the ability to contribute ideas, and receive credit for them. This paper explores gender differences in how men and women communicate and reward each other in team decision-making problems. We find that women are recognized less often for their contributions in male-typed domains.

'Always On' Isn't Always Best for Team Decision-Making

by Roberta Holland

Is it possible for teams to communicate too frequently? Research by Ethan Bernstein and colleagues suggests that groups that meet less often may be better at problem-solving. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

Sexual Harassment: What Employers Should Do Now

by Dina Gerdeman

Organizations are realizing they are not doing enough to stop the inappropriate behavior that can lead to an awkward office environment, lawsuits, and reputation damage. Open for comment; 0 Comments.

Thanks for Nothing: Expressing Gratitude Invites Exploitation by Competitors

by Jeremy Yip, Kelly Kiyeon Lee, Cindy Chan, and Alison Wood Brooks

Think more carefully and strategically about expressing gratitude while negotiations are still underway. Even if negotiators feel grateful for concessions from a counterpart, it may not help them, and it might even hurt them, to express it then and there. Wait until the deal is done before saying thanks.

Amount and Diversity of Digital Emotional Expression Predicts Happiness

by Laura Vuillier, Alison Wood Brooks, June Gruber, Rui Sun, Michael I. Norton, Matthew James Samson, Emiliana Simon-Thomas, Paul Piff, Sarah Fan, Jordi Quoidbach, Charles Gorintin, Pete Fleming, Arturo Bejar, and Dacher Keltner

Emoticons might seem trivial because they require just the tap of a finger, but this study shows how emoticons make a difference in overall emotion expression. People use emoticons to highlight the emotions they intend to convey, and emoticons also serve as predictors—and causes—of happiness and well-being.

Backhanded Compliments: How Negative Comparisons Undermine Flattery

by Ovul Sezer, Alison Wood Brooks, and Michael I. Norton

Backhanded compliments seem like praise but can leave a sting. This study explores the psychology of backhanded compliments. Flatterers deploy backhanded compliments to garner liking while conveying social status. Recipients view praise of this kind as strategic put-downs and penalize would-be flatterers even as the backhanded compliment undermines their motivation and perseverance.