Leigh Thompson is the J. Jay Gerber Professor of Dispute Resolution & Organizations in the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. She is the director of the Kellogg Team and Group Research Center, the Leading High Impact Teams Executive program, High Performance Negotiation Skills Executive program and Negotiating in a Virtual World Executive online program, and co-director of the Constructive Collaboration Executive program and the Navigating Work Place Conflict Executive program.  In addition, she is an Adjunct Professor of Psychology at Northwestern.

Her research focuses on negotiation behavior and performance, creativity, and analogical reasoning. Her most recent research projects include investigations of divergent versus convergent thinking on negotiation performance; mindfulness and negotiation performance; gender and the use of ethically-questionable negotiation strategies; embarrassment and pride and their effects on creativity; and how analogical reasoning improves negotiation performance.

She has published more than 130 research articles and chapters in edited books. She has authored 9 books: The Mind and Heart of the Negotiator (7^th edition, Pearson 2020); Stop Spending, Start Managing (Harvard Business Press, 2016); Making The Team (6^th edition, Pearson 2018); Creative Conspiracy: The New Rules of Breakthrough Collaboration (Harvard Business Press, 2013); The Truth About Negotiations (2^nd edition, Pearson 2013); Creativity and Innovation in Organizational Teams (Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2006); Shared Knowledge in Organizations (with David Messick and John Levine); Organizational Behavior Today (2008); Negotiation: Theory and Research (2006); and The Social Psychology of Organizational Behavior: Essential Reading (2003). 

Most significant 2018-2019 highlights:

     1. Negotiating in a Virtual World:  Mastering High Performance Skills Online Executive Education program

         Online, high-touch, open enrollment Executive Education program.  This intensive program provides an interactive experience in which participants engage in realistic negotiation scenarios, ranging from one-on-one, team-on-team, multi-party, and principal-agent.

     2. Negotiating in a Virtual World MBA course

        Many negotiations occur between people who never meet in person, but instead communicate via information technology, including:  phone, skype, text, email, conference call, etc.  These “virtual” negotiations present novel social and communication challenges for managers and their teams. This course provides participants with the opportunity to develop their negotiation skills in a series of business negotiations conducted with others who are not physically co-present. Students in this course master the key skills of successful negotiation and become proficient in virtual communication.

     3. Negotiating in the “ME TOO” Era:  High Performance Skills for Women program (Kellogg Women’s Leadership Seminar Series)

         Interactive, experiential program for full-time, evening and weekend female MBA students.  Key topics include:  behavioral differences between men and women, salary negotiations, and best practices for improving economic and relational outcomes in long-term negotiations.

     4. KRP:  Kellogg Research Partners

         A pilot program was delivered to 200 of NU Medicine’s leadership team in January 2018 that featured 3 remote sites in addition to a “live” classroom site at Feinberg School of Medicine. Thompson developed a teaching method that allowed for meaningful classroom interaction between remote sites. 

     5.  Northwestern Medicine/Kellogg High Performing Leaders

          Kellogg Research Partners (KRP) was established in January 2017 as a partnership between students in Executive Education programs and Kellogg PhD candidates.  The goal is for our talented and creative PhD candidates to work with managers and executives to address key questions and challenges facing their organizations.  Meaningful and applied research studies are conducted with their employees / managers to inform and impact their business.

     6.  The Mind and Heart of the Negotiator (7^th edition)

          The research-based, comprehensive book includes real world business situations and has international recognition. 

    7.   Finding the Sweetspot:  Win-Win hacks for business and life

          New book project examines “daily negotiations” in life and is research-based and designed to be used in on-line teaching.

     8.  Online video content

          Professor Thompson’s online videos are used extensively as pre- and post- work in custom and open enrollment Executive programs.  Thompson has five major online video platforms:

         (1) Talks at Google, Authors at Google: Stop Spending, Start Managing:  Strategies to Transform Wasteful Habits on February 16, 2017 and with more than 5,425 views. Thompson shares key insights from her book (co-authored with Dr. Tanya Menon), Stop Spending, Start Managing:  Strategies to Transform Wasteful Habits, organized around 5 "traps" that can ensnare even the most sophisticated business leaders:

• The Expertise Trap: reusing old solutions on current problems
• The Winners Trap: allocating additional resources to failing projects
• The Agreement Trap: avoiding conflict to feel like a team player
• The Communication Trap: creating talk and noise around the problem
• The Macromanagement Trap: organizing talented people without conducive conditions

        (2)  "High Performance Collaboration:  Leadership, Teamwork and Negotiation," (Coursera MOOC) rated 4.8/5 and with more than 31,815 enrolled. This program was developed and launched in late 2015 and is part of a five-course Northwestern-wide specialization designed to teach aspiring managers how to develop and expand their leadership skills in dynamic business environments.  In February 2018, Coursera featured Thompson on the Coursera home page (note:  there were 8 featured Coursera “star professors” including Martin Odersky, Founder of the Scale Programming Language, Robert Shiller, Professor of Economics, Yale University and Timothy Geithner, Former U.S. Secretary of the Treasury).

        (3) Teamwork 101: 4-part, sub-hour series that includes: Designing Teams for Success; Optimizing Team Decision Making; People Skills and Emotional Intelligence; and Creativity and Innovation in Teams. 

        (4) Negotiation 101:  4-part, sub-hour series that includes: What can go wrong? What must go right?; How to prepare effectively; Claiming Value; and Creating Value.

        (5) Video Shorts (4 videos): Energetic, professionally-animated videos, each less than 4 minutes in length that describe a common managerial problem, and provide research-based solutions for busy managers.

               a. Brainwriting: How to neutralize the loudmouths

               b. High Performance Negotiation Skills for Women

               c. Managing Virtual Teams

               d. Is Your Team Slacking? (What to Do)

Negotiation, creativity and innovation, teamwork, and knowledge transfer

• PhD, 1988, Northwestern University
• MA, 1984, University of California, Santa Barbara
• BS, 1982, Northwestern University

• J. Jay Gerber Distinguished Professor of Dispute Resolution and Organizations, Management and Organizations, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, 2001-present
• Adjunct Professor of Psychology, Psychology, Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, Northwestern University, 1995-present
• John L. & Helen Kellogg Distinguished Professor of Management and Organizations, Management and Organizations, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, 1995-2001
• Fellow, Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, Stanford University, 1994-1995
• Assistant Professor of Psychology, Psychology, College of Arts & Sciences, University of Washington, 1988-1992
• Adjunct Associate Professor, Management & Organization, School of Business, University of Washington, 1993-1995
• Associate Professor of Psychology, Psychology, College of Arts & Sciences, University of Washington, 1992-1995

Negotiation, high performance teamwork, creativity, emotional intelligence, decision making, virtual teams, gender and negotiations

Constructive Collaboration

The experts show you the conditions and competencies that foster highly productive collaboration in the workplace, and how to ignite a culture of collaboration at all levels in your company and its people.

Enterprise Leadership Program

Leadership at the enterprise level means rising to the challenge. No longer is your growth linear — it’s exponential. The focus moves past the single team or unit to the enterprise as a whole, beyond functional skills to strategic decisions based on a broader perspective. Kellogg Executive Education’s Enterprise Leadership Program prepares you to lead at height and scale and helps you develop an anticipatory mindset.

Executive Development Program

The Kellogg Executive Development Program transforms organizational leaders. It equips top-performing, mid-level to senior managers to make decisions and take strategic action based upon both traditional and innovative business practices. Participants build skills and awareness as they realize their potential for assuming general management roles.

Governing Family Enterprises

Join peers from leading family-run organizations to learn how family governance can help sustain business continuity, family unity and commitment. Come away equipped and energized to realize your vision for the future of your family enterprise with confidence.

High Performance Negotiation Skills

Dive into the science of negotiation and learn the essentials of deal making and dispute resolution. Learn new and proven negotiation strategies and techniques and hone your skills through challenging simulations and constructive feedback.

Leading High-Impact Teams

From the thought leaders that set the standard for building and leading effective teams, this intensive program delivers deep insight into Kellogg’s proven approaches and practical tools and techniques you can use immediately to solve complex team challenges.

Navigating Workplace Conflict

This program is designed for anyone working in organizations where people problems and personalities challenge productivity. It is ideal for small businesses in which developing a collaborative culture is essential, as well as large organizations with complex reporting relationships. Organizations that are experiencing fundamental change, those that are trying to absorb new acquisitions, family businesses preparing for generational transitions and geographically-challenged teams are perfectly suited for this program.

The PHYSICIAN CEO™ Program
Women's Senior Leadership Program

Kellogg created this special leadership program for women executives to equip top female talent to break through the barriers that have historically impeded their career development and empower them to take their place at the highest levels of corporate leadership.

Negotiation Strategies (MORSX-470-0)
Negotiation Strategies teaches the art and science of achieving objectives in interdependent relationships, both inside and outside the company. Students practice cross-cultural negotiation, dispute resolution, coalition formation and multiparty negotiations, extremely competitive negotiations, and negotiating via information technology.

Leading High Impact Teams (MORSX-460-0)
This course examines the design, management, and leadership of teams in organizational settings. The focus is on the interpersonal processes and structural characteristics that influence the effectiveness of teams, the dynamics of intra-team relationships, and sharing knowledge and information in teams. The purpose of this course is to understand the theory and processes of group and team behavior so that leaders can successfully work with teams. Students who take advantage of everything this course has to offer will become comfortable and adept in leading and managing groups and teams.

Negotiations Fundamentals (MORS-472-5)
This course is designed to provide the fundamentals of negotiation strategy and to improve students' skills in all phases of negotiation. The course provides an understanding of prescriptive and descriptive negotiation theory as it applies to two party negotiations, team negotiations, resolution of disputes, agents and ethics, and management of the negotiation process. The course is based on a series of simulated negotiations in a variety of contexts. Attendance at every class meeting is mandatory.

Negotiating in a Virtual World (MORS-471-5)
Negotiation is the art and science of securing agreements between two or more interdependent parties who have different incentives, but attempt to reach mutual agreement to maximize their outcomes. Many negotiations occur between people who never meet in person, but instead communicate via information technology, including: phone, skype, text, email, conference call, etc. These "virtual" negotiations present novel social and communication challenges for managers and their teams. This course provides participants with the opportunity to develop their negotiation skills in a series of business negotiations conducted with others who are not physically co-present. Students in this course will master the key skills of successful negotiation and become proficient in virtual communication. We will never meet in person. Instead, the course will be conducted online, with students negotiating with others via the communication medium of their choice (e.g., face-to-face; phone; email; text; skype; or a combination of these). IMPORTANT: The course begins on the first day of the new term. All of the course information will be on the CANVAS course website. That will be our go-to-place for everything! Mandatory assignments are due the first Tuesday of the new term.