Entrepreneurship & Innovation

The current research examined the relationship between hierarchy and vocal acoustic cues. Using Brunswik's lens model as a framework, we explored how hierarchical rank influences the acoustic properties of a speaker's voice and how these hierarchy-based acoustic cues affect perceivers' inferences of a speaker's rank. By using objective measurements of speakers' acoustic cues and controlling for baseline cue levels, we were able to precisely capture the relationship between acoustic cues and hierarchical rank, as well as the covariation among the cues.

The current research demonstrates that authenticity is directly linked to morality. Across five experiments, we found that experiencing inauthenticity consistently led participants to feel more immoral and impure. This inauthenticity-feeling immoral link produced an increased desire to cleanse oneself and to engage in moral compensation by behaving prosocially. We established the role that impurity played in these effects through mediation and moderation.

Functional accounts of hierarchy propose that hierarchy increases group coordination and reduces conflict. In contrast, dysfunctional accounts claim that hierarchy impairs performance by preventing low-ranking team members from voicing their potentially valuable perspectives and insights. The current research presents evidence for both the functional and dysfunctional accounts of hierarchy within the same dataset. Specifically, we offer empirical evidence that hierarchical cultural values affect the outcomes of teams in high-stakes environments through group processes.

Eight studies found a robust negative relationship between the experience of power and the experience of loneliness. Dispositional power and loneliness were negatively correlated (Study 1). Experimental inductions established causality: we manipulated high versus low power through autobiographical essays, assignment to positions, or control over resources, and found that each manipulation showed that high versus low power decreased loneliness (Studies 2a–2c).

Having a well-defined hierarchy can contribute to organizational effectiveness: it helps people know who does what, when and how, and promotes efficient interactions by setting clear expectations for the behaviors of people of different ranks. This is especially true when people feel under threat, helping to restore a sense of order and control. However, sometimes hierarchy can hurt as much as it helps. In complex, dynamic situations, leaders need access to the most complete and varied information to make the best decisions.

At some point, every company makes a mistake that requires an apology — to an individual; a group of customers, employees, or business partners; or the public at large. And more often than not, companies and their leaders fail to apologize effectively, if at all, which can severely damage their reputations and their relationships with stakeholders. Companies need clearer guidelines for determining whether a mistake merits an apology and, when it does, for crafting and delivering an effective message.

The construct of power is part of the structural foundation of social psychology. Two of social psychology's most seminal works — Milgram's experiments on obedience to authority (Milgram, 1963) and Zimbardo's prison experiment (Zimbardo, 1973, 1974) — involved differences in power. In more recent years, the contemporary landscape of social psychology continues to feature power prominently.

Successful managers and leaders need to effectively navigate their organizational worlds, from motivating customers and employees to managing diversity to preventing and resolving conflicts. Perspective-taking is a psychological process that is particularly relevant to each of these activities. The current review critically examines perspective-taking research conducted by both management scholars and social psychologists and specifies perspective-taking's antecedents, consequences, mechanisms, and moderators, as well as identifies theoretical and/or empirical shortfalls.

Although economists, politicians, and business leaders have long emphasized the importance of entrepreneurship, defining and characterizing entrepreneurship has been elusive. Researchers have been unable to systematically connect the type of high-impact entrepreneurship found in regions such as Silicon Valley with the overall incidence of entrepreneurship in the population.