by Michael D. Watkins - Publications - Faculty & Research

Article

Don't Stop Believing: Rituals Improve Performance by Decreasing Anxiety

By: Alison Wood Brooks, Julianna Schroeder, Jane Risen, Francesca Gino, Adam D. Galinsky, Michael I. Norton and Maurice Schweitzer

From public speaking to first dates, people frequently experience performance anxiety. And when experienced immediately before or during performance, anxiety harms performance. Across a series of experiments, we explore the efficacy of a common strategy that people... View Details

Keywords: Behavior; Performance; Emotions

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21 May 2014
Lessons from the Classroom

CORe: HBS Powers Up Online Program on Business Fundamentals

protagonist. "When you discover truths by answering a series of questions, you are not just learning, but also learning how to learn," says Narayanan, Thomas D. Casserly, Jr. Professor of Business... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Education

25 Jun 2014
Lessons from the Classroom

FIELD Trip: Conquering the Gap Between Knowing and Doing

older man led them to the back of one of the homes. Inside, he showed them a group of people huddled around the glow of two laptops, powered by a generator. “More than any other course, it teaches humility” "He said, 'All of my... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Education

1998
Book

Competing by Design: The Power of Organizational Architectures

By: D. Nadler and Michael Tushman

Keywords: Organizational Design

Citation

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24 Jul 2013
Op-Ed

Detroit Files for Bankruptcy: HBS Faculty Weigh In

the income taxes paid by residents with good jobs, from the tolls paid by drivers, from property and sales taxes. Without revenue, costs can't be covered. Can cities with high liabilities expect to be bailed... View Details

Keywords: by John Macomber, Robert C. Pozen, Eric D. Werker & Benjamin Kennedy; Auto

09 Aug 2004
Research & Ideas

A Diagnostic for Disruptive Innovation

the draw anymore. By conducting a series of diagnostics, companies in any industry can quickly identify the most promising opportunities. This article shows how to conduct customer, portfolio, and competitor diagnostics to pinpoint the... View Details

Keywords: by Scott D. Anthony, Mark W. Johnson & Matt Eyring

01 Jan 2003
News

03 Jun 2013
Research & Ideas

The Power of Rituals in Life, Death, and Business

winning team). But what's the point? Behavioral scientist Michael I. Norton became interested in mourning rituals after reading Harvard University President Drew Gilpin Faust's This Republic of Suffering, which describes elaborate ways... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

23 Jun 2003
Research & Ideas

Historically Speaking: A Roundtable at HBS

faculty, whose scholarship and teaching skills attract hundreds of Harvard MBA students to their classrooms each year. Among the latest books by HBS historians are publications by Professor Chandler,... View Details

Keywords: by Jim Aisner

12 Jul 2006
Research & Ideas

Competition the Cure for Healthcare

Last month HBS Working Knowledge offered an excerpt from Redefining Health Care: Creating Value-Based Competition on Results, by Harvard Business School professor Michael E. Porter and Elizabeth Olmsted... View Details

Keywords: by Roger Thompson; Health

14 Apr 2003
Research & Ideas

Pay-for-Performance Doesn’t Always Pay Off

their ability to reach if not surpass the goals, start banking on the extra money. In practice, however, the process of connecting pay to performance may be far trickier that it at first appears, according to HBS professor Michael Beer.... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

Awards

Kulp-Wright Book Award

By: Max H. Bazerman

Winner of the 2006 Kulp-Wright Book Award for Predictable Surprises (with Michael D. Watkins, Harvard Business School Press, 2004), presented by the American Risk and Insurance Association for the book considered to be the most influential text published on the... View Details

17 Sep 2024
HBS Case

The Climate Targets Leaders Need to Know as Regulations Loom

Michael Toffel, the Senator John Heinz Professor of Environmental Management at Harvard Business School. Roughly 42 percent of Fortune 500 companies said they’d reached an environmental target or committed to reaching one View Details

Keywords: by Rachel Layne

11 Apr 2023
Op-Ed

The First 90 Hours: What New CEOs Should—and Shouldn't—Do to Set the Right Tone

10 weeks won’t make up for any ground that gets lost. When Michael Watkins published his best-selling book The First 90 Days 20 years ago, the world was a kinder, gentler, and slower place. Today, given the... View Details

Keywords: by John Quelch

03 Jan 2011
Research & Ideas

Most Popular Articles of 2010

Judging by the most-read articles and faculty working papers over the last year, our readers continue to be fascinated by the emergence of social networks and their potential impacts on business and... View Details

Keywords: by Staff

08 Mar 2021
In Practice

COVID Killed the Traditional Workplace. What Should Companies Do Now?

A year ago, COVID-19 forced many companies to send employees home—often with a laptop and a prayer. Now, with COVID cases subsiding and vaccinations rising, the prospect of returning to old office routines appears more possible. But will employees want to flock back to... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman

30 Apr 2020
Book

Fighting Climate Change Requires a New Capitalism

Rebecca Henderson spent her young adult years living two lives. At work, she preached the risks of resisting change to MBA students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, drawing on lessons she learned while watching factories close as a management consultant.... View Details

Keywords: by Danielle Kost; Energy

20 Oct 2010
Op-Ed

Export Competitiveness: Reversing the Logic

D.C.: 2010. Clemens, M. and J. Williamson. 2004. "Why Did the Tariff-Growth Correlation Change after 1950?" Journal of Economic Growth 9 (1): 5-46. Coe, D. and E. Helpman. 1995. "International R&D Spillovers."... View Details

Keywords: by Christian Ketels

06 Dec 2004
What Do You Think?

Why Do Managers Fail to Act on Their Predictions?

Orleans. Although Southwest has never had a fatal accident in its history, the odds are that it will sometime in the future. And the organization is ready to respond to what Max Bazerman and Michael Watkins... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

Research Summary

Corporate Diplomacy

Michael Watkins is defining a top management function of increasing importance: the conduct of corporate diplomacy. Senior executives conduct the business equivalent of international diplomacy when they negotiate to sustain or transform relationships with influential... View Details

Publications