|
Research Overview:
Professor Roberto's research focuses on strategic decision-making
processes and senior management teams. His work has examined how leaders
can cultivate constructive conflict within their executive teams so as
to enhance the quality of strategic decisions, while simultaneously
building the consensus required to implement those choices effectively.
As a subset of this research stream, Professor Roberto has examined a
number of catastrophic group and organizational failures such as the
Columbia Space Shuttle Accident, the 1996 Mount Everest tragedy, and the
1994 Storm King Mountain incident. This work has explored the
organizational and interpersonal decision-making dynamics that cause
large-scale failures to occur. Professor Roberto's latest research
examines the capabilities that each leader must master so as to detect
the smaller problems that often precede major crises and failures.
In his 2005 book, Why
Great Leaders Don't Take Yes For An Answer, Professor Roberto
examines why many organizations do not engage in sufficient dissent and
debate. He argues that the lack of candid dialogue and constructive
conflict impairs the strategic decision-making in many corporations and
public sector institutions. Of course, dissent alone does not improve
decision-making. Great leaders must stimulate a productive debate, but
then drive toward closure as well. As they strive for closure,
successful leaders build the commitment and shared understanding
required for an effective implementation. Drawing from nearly ten years
of his own research, as well as the studies of others, Professor Roberto
provides a primer for leaders who want to improve their decision-making
processes through the astute cultivation and management of constructive
conflict.
In his new book,
Know What You Don't Know, Professor Roberto shifts the focus
from problem-solving to what he calls the "problem-finding" capabilities
of effective leaders. This new book examines how leaders can
unearth the small problems that are likely to lead to large-scale
failures in their organizations. He explains how leaders
need to shift from fighting fires to detecting smoke, so that they can
detect and interrupt the chain of errors that often precedes a major
failure. Then, the book identifies seven key problem-finding
capabilities that every leader must develop in order to become
successful at averting crises in their organizations.
|
Selected Articles:
Roberto, Michael A. (2007). “Why
Catastrophic Organizational Failures Happen.” In C. Wankel (ed.), 21st
Century Management. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
Roberto, Michael A., Richard M.J. Bohmer, and Amy C. Edmondson, "Facing
Ambiguous Threats." Harvard Business Review. (Fall 2006).
Edmondson, Amy C., Michael A. Roberto, Richard M.J. Bohmer, Erika M.
Ferlins, and Laura R. Feldman. "The Recovery Window: Organizational
Learning Following Ambiguous Threats in High-Risk Organizations." in
Organization at the Limit: Lessons from the Columbia Disaster, Eds.
M. Farjoun and W. Starbuck, Blackwell Publishers, United Kingdom (2005).
Edmondson, A., Michael A. Roberto, and Anita Tucker,
"Children's
Hospital and Clinics." Journal of Organizational Behavior Education
(2006).
Roberto, Michael A.
"Don't Take Yes For An Answer." Government Executive. Vol. 38 No.8.
(2006).
Roberto, Michael A. and Lynne Levesque. "Strategic
Initiatives: Changing the Firm's DNA." Sloan Management Review
(Summer 2005).
Roberto, Michael A.
"Deciding How To Decide." CIO Magazine. (November 1, 2005).
Roberto, Michael A.
"Why
Making The Decisions The Right Way Is More Important Than Making the
Right Decisions." Ivey Business Journal (2005).
Garvin, David A., and Michael A. Roberto.
"Change
Through Persuasion." Harvard Business Review (February 2005).
Roberto, Michael A. "Teaching
Business Leadership Using Non-Business Case Studies." International
Journal of Leadership Education. (2005).
Roberto, Michael A. "Strategic
Decision-Making Processes: Beyond the Efficiency-Consensus Tradeoff."
Group and Organization Management Vol. 29, no. 6 (2004): 625-658.
Edmondson, A., Michael A. Roberto, and Michael Watkins.
"A
Dynamic Model of Top Management Team Effectiveness: Managing
Unstructured Task Streams." Leadership Quarterly 14, no. 3 (June
2003): 297-325.
Roberto, Michael A.
"The
Stable Core and Dynamic Periphery in Top Management Teams."
Management Decision 41, no. 2 (2003).
Roberto, Michael A.
"Lessons
from Everest: The Interaction of Cognitive Bias, Psychological Safety,
and System Complexity." California Management Review (fall 2002).
Roberto, Michael A.
"Making
Difficult Decisions in Turbulent Times." Ivey Business Journal
(January 2002).
Garvin, David A., and Michael A. Roberto.
"What
You Don't Know About Making Decisions." Harvard Business Review 79,
no. 8 (September 2001): 108-116.
|
