Publications

March 2000 (Revised April 2001)
Case

Jill Greenthal at Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette (B): The TCI/AT&T Deal

By: Ashish Nanda, Thomas J. DeLong and Sarah S. Khetani

Documents the hectic and grueling work done by Jill Greenthal's team at Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette in an attempt to execute a landmark deal on behalf of a key client. View Details

Keywords: Leadership; Negotiation Process; Service Delivery; Groups and Teams; Entrepreneurship; Negotiation Deal; Gender; Banking Industry; Service Industry; Telecommunications Industry

Research Summary

Current Projects

To further study team coaching and creativity, I have undertaken two field-based studies. In collaboration with Teresa Amabile, I am exploring helping and collaborative behaviors though the analysis of daily diary entries from creative work teams at a design firm.... View Details

April 2012
Article

Coming Through When It Matters Most

By: Heidi K. Gardner

All teams would like to think they do their best work when the stakes are highest-when the company's future or their own rests on the outcome of their projects. But too often something else happens. In extensive studies of teams at professional service firms, I have... View Details

Keywords: Groups and Teams; Projects; Performance Expectations; Failure; Risk and Uncertainty; Safety; Experience and Expertise; Knowledge Sharing

Read Now

2009
Chapter

Collaboration Across Knowledge Boundaries within Diverse Teams: Reciprocal Expertise Affirmation as an Enabling Condition

By: Amy C. Edmondson, Kate Roloff and Lucy H. MacPhail

We review research on expertise diversity, psychological safety, team collaboration, and role identity to propose a model in which reciprocal affirmations of expertise identity among team members—a feature of the team environment that we conceptualize as a dimension of... View Details

Keywords: Interpersonal Communication; Experience and Expertise; Learning; Knowledge Use and Leverage; Groups and Teams; Familiarity; Identity; Cooperation

January 1997 (Revised June 1997)
Case

Corporate New Ventures at Procter & Gamble

By: Teresa M. Amabile and Dean Whitney

Consumer products giant Procter & Gamble is faced with an urgent need to revitalize new-product innovation, given its recent focus on incremental product improvements and its aggressive growth goals. As part of this effort, the company's top executives form a small,... View Details

Keywords: Innovation Strategy; Creativity; Working Conditions; Corporate Entrepreneurship; Groups and Teams; Retail Industry; Ohio

October 2012
Course Overview Note

FIELD 2—Working with Global Partners

By: Felix Oberholzer-Gee

Most FIELD 2 teams develop great working relationships with their Global Partner. But managing Global Partner expectations can be challenging. This note describes three scenarios with which FIELD teams struggled in the past and asks the reader to make decisions about... View Details

Keywords: Fieldwork; Partnerships; Global; Collaboration; Global Business; Global Collaboration; Partners and Partnerships

Research Summary

Teamwork and Innovative Behavior with Professor Jeff Polzer and Hila Lifshitz

In a field setting, we explore how teamwork could enhance team members' interpersonal relationships and work performance. We collect longitudinal survey data and measure creative performance of a US company's employees before, during, and after they... View Details

October 2003 (Revised January 2016)
Exercise

The BCPC Internet Strategy Team: An Exercise

By: Amy C. Edmondson and Laura Feldman

This short fictional case forms the basis of a team decision-making exercise. The case, inspired by a real decision facing a major telecommunications company, describes a cross-functional management team convened by the CEO for the purpose of developing a... View Details

Keywords: Groups and Teams; Decision Making; Risk and Uncertainty; Information Management; Perspective; Product Launch; Internet and the Web; Knowledge Sharing; Telecommunications Industry

January 2017 (Revised December 2017)
Case

Merging American Airlines and US Airways (A)

By: David G. Fubini, David A. Garvin and Carin-Isabel Knoop

In February 2013, US Airways announced that it would merge with American Airlines to create the world’s largest airline. Doug Parker, the CEO of US Airways, would become CEO of the new American Airlines Group (AAL). The case describes a number of critical decisions... View Details

Keywords: Airlines; Merger; Takeover; Integration Strategy; Merger Integration; Mergers and Acquisitions; Decision Making; Governance; Management Teams; Operations; Organizational Culture; Air Transportation Industry; United States

April 2001
Article

Academic-Practitioner Collaboration in Management Research: A Case of Cross-Profession Collaboration

By: T. M. Amabile, C. Patterson, Jennifer Mueller, T. Wojcik, P. Odomirok, M. Marsh and S. Kramer

We present a case of academic-practitioner research collaboration to illuminate three potential determinants of the success of such cross-profession collaborations: collaborative team characteristics, collaboration environment characteristics, and collaboration... View Details

Keywords: Research; Cases; Analytics and Data Science; Theory

Find at Harvard

08 Aug 2023
Research & Ideas

Black Employees Not Only Earn Less, But Deal with Bad Bosses and Poor Conditions

gaps.” You Might Also Like: It’s Not All About Pay: College Grads Want Jobs That ‘Change the World’ Confront Workplace Inequity in 2023: Dig Deep, Build Bridges, Take Collective Action What's Missing from the Racial Equity Dialogue? Feedback or ideas to share? Email... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding

2017
Teaching Note

Global Collaboration Simulation: Tip of the Iceberg

By: Tsedal Neeley

This Teaching Note reproduces the communication dynamics that occur during global collaborations, in which diverse work teams interact in the commonly used English business language or lingua franca. View Details

Keywords: Communication; Cooperation; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues

February 2004 (Revised August 2004)
Case

National Semiconductor's India Design Center

By: Jeffrey T. Polzer and Elizabeth Kind

The senior managers of the India Design Center used 360-degree feedback to develop their team competencies. Now, three new managers are about to join their management team, and Ashok Kumar, director of the center, must decide how to integrate the new managers in a way... View Details

Keywords: Groups and Teams; Information Technology Industry; India

January 1995 (Revised September 2011)
Case

Charlotte Beers at Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide (A)

By: Herminia M. Ibarra and Nicole Sackley

Examines Beer's actions on assuming leadership of Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide, the world's sixth largest advertising agency, during a period of rapid industry change and organizational crisis. Focuses on how Beers, the first outsider CEO, engages and leads a senior team... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Change and Adaptation; Leadership; Advertising; Organizational Structure; Advertising Industry

02 Aug 2013
Working Paper Summaries

J. Richard Hackman (1940-2013)

Keywords: by Ruth Wageman & Teresa M. Amabile

05 Jul 2006
Working Paper Summaries

Implementing New Practices: An Empirical Study of Organizational Learning in Hospital Intensive Care Units

Keywords: by Anita L. Tucker, Ingrid M. Nembhard & Amy C. Edmondson; Health

29 Jan 2018
Book

How 'Teaming' Saved 33 Lives in the Chilean Mining Disaster

poking drill holes deep into the earth in the hopes of hearing sounds to indicate that the men were alive. Another worked on how to keep them alive if found, and a third brainstormed solutions for how to extract them from the refuge. The... View Details

Keywords: by Amy C. Edmondson; Mining

April 2018
Case

Ferrari

By: Stefan Thomke, Elena Corsi and Ashok Nimgade

Ferrari is among the world’s most powerful brands, but how the company operates has remained mysterious. The case reveals the inner workings of the company—the Ferrari Way—from the way it designs, produces, and markets its cars, to how its leadership team is driving... View Details

Keywords: Growth; Innovation; Technology Adoption; Product Design; Business Strategy; Technological Innovation; Operations; Management; Growth and Development; Auto Industry