Elizabeth A. Mannix

Management Challenges in A New Time

As the year 2000 approached, so too did the years 5760, 2544, and 1420, according to the Jewish, Buddhist, and Moslem dating systems, respectively. Still, the coming of the year 2000 held meaning for most Western societies, serving as an opportunity for broader speculation about the new millennium and the 21st century. In the field of management, cycles of boom and bust in Asia had called into question new ways of organizing hailed in the 1980s, and questions and concerns mounted about inadequacies of 20th century views of business firms. Opinions were astonishingly diverse and often contradictory, but the central theme was change--dramatic change--and the idea that, to cope with it, managers ought to strategize anew and shape and reshape their firms.

Conflict transformation: a longitudinal investigation of the relationships between different types of intragroup conflict and the moderating role of conflict resolution

In this longitudinal study, the authors examine the relationships between task, relationship, and process conflict over time. They also look at the role of conflict resolution in determining whether certain forms of intragroup conflict are related to the appearance of other forms of conflict over time. Their findings indicate a negative and long-lasting impact of process conflict occurring early in the teams interaction. Specifically, they find that process conflict, but not task or relationship conflict, occurring early in a teams interaction leads to higher levels of all other conflict types for the remaining interactions of the team. In addition, the authors find that the effect of process conflict on the other types of conflict over time may be limited when members are able to resolve their process conflicts at the start of their time together.

Conflict in Small Groups: The Meaning and Consequences of Process Conflict

Through three studies of interacting small groups, we aimed to better understand the meaning and consequences of process conflict. Study 1 was an exploratory analysis of qualitative data that helped us to identify the unique dimensions of process conflict to more clearly distinguish it from task and relationship conflict. Study 2 used a broader sampling of participants to (a) demonstrate why process conflict has been difficult to discriminate from task conflict in many conflict scales, and (b) develop a two-factor Process Conflict Scale that effectively distinguishes process from task conflict. Study 3 used this new scale to examine the relationship between process conflict and group viability (group performance, satisfaction, and effective group process). The results showed that process conflict negatively affects group performance, member satisfaction, and group coordination.

Interest Alignment and Coalitions in Multiparty Negotiation

This study tested hypotheses developed from the distinct literatures on negotiations and coalitions and hypotheses integrating the two. In a complex, three-person negotiation simulation, subjects h...

Power imbalance and the pattern of exchange in dyadic negotiation

We investigate how a key structural aspect of negotiation—power—combines with aspiration level to affect the interaction pattern of negotiators. Conflicting research findings have revealed that in most cases negotiators with anequal balance of power reach agreements of higher joint gain than negotiators with an unequal power balance, but in some instances the opposite result has been found. We suggest that it is important to consider the interaction between the negotiators to explain these varying findings. We propose that when unequal power negotiators are able to reach agreements of high joint gain it is due to the efforts of the low power party. In addition, we argue that the low power player will be most likely to drive the search for a solution of high joint gain when he or she also has high aspirations. We tested these proposals in a market negotiation with integrative potential. To examine the pattern of negotiation, all offers and counter-offers were written. The results indicated that overall, equal power dyads achieved higher joint outcomes than unequal power dyads. Under unequal power, the hypothesis that higher joint outcomes would be obtained when the low power player had high aspirations received partial support. In addition, support was found for the hypothesis that in unequal power dyads low power players would be responsible for driving solutions of higher joint gain.

Resource dilemmas and discount rates in decision making groups

Abstract In an exercise which simulates the organization as a resource dilemma, discount rates were manipulated to examine their impact on coalition formation and group outcomes. Subjects played a 15-round resource allocation game. They had the option of forming coalitions, which decreased the size of the resource pool, or practicing collective resource allocation, which increased it. Groups with a high discount rate used resource distribution strategies (coalition formation) that resulted in lower individual as well as group outcomes. Groups in the low discount condition adopted collective strategies that increased the size of their resource pool over time. Implications for small group decision making in organizatios are discussed.

Investigating Conflict, Power, and Status Within and Among Groups

This article investigates the concepts and perspectives of conflict, power, and status developed across the disciplines of political science, psychology, and sociology. Although the different disciplines, at times, have different assumptions about actors and interactions, there is a great deal of similarity. This similarity allows one to uncover some general principles that apply to group behavior. This article advocates and illustrates using institutional rules to analyze the research within and across areas.

The Importance of Who You Meet: Effects of Self- versus Other- Concerns among Negotiators in the United States, the People's Republic of China, and Japan

Abstract This study examines intracultural negotiation within three different cultures—the United States (US), the People’s Republic of China (PRC), and Japan. Within these cultures, we focus on the interactive effects of the self-concerns (operationalized as aspiration level) and other-concerns (operationalized as egoistic vs. prosocial motives) of negotiators in a dyadic setting ( De Dreu, Weingart, & Kwon, 2000 ; Pruitt & Rubin, 1986 ). After allowing negotiators to set their own aspiration levels, we predicted that the positive effect on final individual profit of having a higher aspiration than one’s opponent would be stronger among negotiators with an egoistic social motive orientation. We also hypothesized that egoistic negotiators with higher aspiration levels than their opponents would achieve greater profit in the PRC and Japan, relative to their counterparts in the US. We argue that this effect is due to “who you meet” as a negotiation opponent—there is a higher probability of encountering an egoistic negotiation opponent in the US, but a higher probability of encountering a prosocial negotiation opponent in the PRC and Japan. Our results supported these hypotheses. Implications for the literatures on negotiation and cross-cultural research are discussed.

Conflict and Creativity in Interdisciplinary Teams

We examine the effects of conflict and conflict asymmetry on creativity in interdisciplinary teams. Testing our hypotheses on teams working on graduate-level nanobiotechnology projects, we found task conflict to have a positive relationship with creativity whereas relationship conflict had a negative relationship with creativity. Our results also revealed that relationship conflict asymmetry had a positive effect on creativity. Examining the two components of creativity separately, we found that relationship conflict asymmetry explained variance in the novelty component, whereas task conflict, team size, and functional diversity explained variance in the usefulness component.

The impact of distributive uncertainty on coalition formation in organizations

Abstract This paper examines the tendency of group members to form coalitions when the effects of such behavior are harmful to the larger group. The groups under study must distribute a limited pool of resources among members in a social dilemma situation. If coalitions are formed, the resource is replenished at lower rate than if coalitions are not formed. The incidence and nature of coalition behavior are examined through a cognitive approach to group choice, which draws from equity theory, social dilemmas, and coalition research. The results indicate that groups lacking an established distribution rule are more likely to form coalitions than groups operating under an established distribution rule. Groups in the uncertain condition had significantly lower individual, as well as group, outcomes. Further, groups lacking a distribution rule tended to establish a normative rule; both total group distributions and coalition distributions (when formed) were anchored by available, but not necessarily relevant, information.