Microcommunities Overview
The Microcommunities initiative is one way the OB Division brings a big community down to a human scale. These small, self-organized groups connect members around shared interests, identities, or professional goals—creating space for meaningful conversations, ongoing engagement, and a stronger sense of belonging.
Each Microcommunity finds its own rhythm. Some meet virtually throughout the year, others share resources or collaborate on projects. The cornerstone of the initiative is the Microcommunity Coffee Hours at AOM—casual, welcoming gatherings designed to launch new groups and reconnect existing ones.
Whether you're diving into a new research area, navigating a particular career stage, or seeking connection with others who share your lived experience, Microcommunities are a way to find your people—and stay connected throughout the year.
Resources
We’re always looking for field leaders to help create and sustain Microcommunities. If you're interested in starting or stewarding a group, reach out to learn more.
Kira Schabram, The Pennsylvania State University, schabram@psu.edu
Fadel Matta, University of Georgia, fmatta@uga.edu
Christopher Myers, Johns Hopkins University, cmyers@jhu.edu
Current Microcommunities
Affect, Organizational Cultures, & Multicultural Management
Conversation Research
Leadership and Emotions Community
Pan-European
Meaning(fulness) at Work
Modern Team Arrangements
New Directions in Gender Research
Relationships Across Differences (RADs)
Social Networks Society
Teams
Trust
Work-Nonwork
Workplace – Rethinking Where Work Happens
Affect, Organizational Cultures, & Multicultural Management
The Affect, Organizational Cultures, & Multicultural Management micro-community is an interdisciplinary and international group of scholars who share a fascination with how cultural values, dimensions, norms, and socialization processes – both cognitive and emotional – profoundly shape human behavior within and beyond organizations. Scholarship from this group integrates theory from psychology, sociology, anthropology, and international management to inform leadership, teamwork, and organization processes in an increasingly globalized world. Research stemming from this micro-community spans the divisions of OB, IM, CM, and SIM, among others.
Beyond, the AOM Annual Meeting, members of this group are also active in the Berkeley Center for Workplace Culture and Innovation and attend the Berkeley Culture Connect Conference. Our group also includes current and former members of the Michele Gelfand (Standford GSB) and UNC Chapel Hill Culture Labs.
Our community offer opportunities for mentorship and networking to PhD students of all stages and junior faculty. Above all, we are committed to supporting rigorous and responsible scholarship that broadens the narrative on how culture, emotion, and norms influence behavior within organizations and beyond.
We welcome scholars across all AOM divisions and at all career stages who share our interest in affect, organizational culture, and cross-cultural management.
For more information on our community and upcoming events, please reach out to Giselle Antoine at gantoine@wustl.edu.
Conversation Research
The Conversation Research Community brings together scholars interested in how people communicate to make sense of one another in social and organizational contexts. Research covers a wide range of settings, from workplace collaboration and negotiations to legal proceedings, crisis communication, and everyday interactions.
We are an interdisciplinary group, drawing on perspectives from organizational behavior, psychology, sociology, communication, and computational modeling. Members' research examines the unfolding of dialogue, and how conversational strategies—such as framing, humor, self-disclosure, and deliberate pauses—shape cooperation, persuasion, and problem-solving. Scholars explore how social, cultural, and technological factors affect interactions and how individuals manage competing goals, interpret ambiguous signals, and coordinate meaning in real time.
The aim of the community is to foster discussions and collaborations, and advance understanding of conversation as both a practical skill and a powerful social process.
More information, including resources and a quarterly newsletter, is available at https://sites.google.com/view/conversation-research.We welcome scholars across divisions and career stages who share our interest! We plan to have Professional Development Workshops (PDWs) and networking events.
To join and learn more, please reach out to Einav Hart <EHart8@gmu.edu> and Shereen Chaudhry <shereen.chaudhry@chicagobooth.edu>
Leadership and Emotions Community
The Leadership and Emotions Community within the OB Division brings together scholars who are passionate about exploring how leadership processes intersect with emotional experiences in organizational life. Our members examine a wide range of topics—from emotional intelligence and emotion regulation to affective events, emotional labor, leader-follower dynamics, and the role of emotions in decision-making, motivation, and well-being.
We are an interdisciplinary, international group that values theoretical diversity and methodological rigor. Our research draws from psychology, sociology, neuroscience, and management, using both qualitative and quantitative approaches. Whether studying charisma and transformational leadership, the emotional challenges of ethical leadership, or the role of emotions in crisis and change, our community fosters collaboration and the advancement of impactful, emotionally informed leadership research.
Many of our members are also active in EmotionsNet and the Network of Leadership Scholars (NLS), two global communities committed to advancing theory and research on emotions and leadership. These affiliations strengthen our interdisciplinary ties and help us build a vibrant, supportive network across the Academy and beyond.
In addition to contributing to the Academy’s scholarly dialogue, we offer mentoring opportunities, Professional Development Workshops (PDWs), and networking events to support early-career scholars and promote inclusive community engagement. We are committed to supporting rigorous, relevant, and responsible research that deepens our understanding of how emotions shape leadership and organizational behavior across global contexts.
Get Involved
We welcome OB Division members at all career stages who share our interest in leadership and emotions.
To learn more, participate in upcoming events, or join our mailing list, please reach out to:
Marie Dasborough
Professor in Management
University of Miami
m.dasborough@miami.edu
Pan-European
This Microcommunity brings together Organizational Behavior (OB) scholars with ties to Europe—whether through academic affiliation, research focus, or international mobility. Our mission is to foster a vibrant, inclusive, and supportive scholarly network that spans European borders and connects with the wider global community, addressing the shared challenges and opportunities of working in diverse academic contexts.
We are a growing community of OB scholars at all career stages who have lived, worked, and conducted research across multiple countries. Members bring valuable insights into building academic careers within different European institutions and systems, as well as navigating professional and personal transitions across borders.
Our gatherings span in-person meetings at the annual conference, as well as virtual events (we kicked off with an online session in March), and we hope to sponsor locally hosted meetups in France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, the UK, and other regions throughout the 2025/2026 academic year. These formats offer flexible opportunities to connect, exchange experiences, and support one another through collaboration, mentorship, and community dialogue.
We warmly welcome OB scholars who have recently relocated, are navigating new academic and cultural contexts, or simply wish to strengthen cross-border networks rooted in—but not limited to—Europe.
To join or learn more, please contact:
📧 Gouri Mohan (g.mohan@ieseg.fr) or Minna Paunova (mpaunova@escp.eu)
Let’s build something meaningful—together, within and beyond Europe.
Meaning(fulness) at Work
The Meaning(fulness) at Work microcommunity was born in December 2003 at a Positive Organizational Scholarship (POS) Conference in a working session on meaning, when several scholars interested in meaning in work and organizations came together and decided to meet up again to talk about their research. In May 2004, Amy Wrzesniewski organized the first inaugural May Meaning Meeting at the University of Michigan, and the community has met up each year since then. Select faculty and doctoral students from across the country gather to share their research and gain a better understanding of how employees experience meaning and/or meaningfulness in and at work. The group has yielded new collaborations and exchanges of ideas among an ever-growing set of active researchers. The community torch is currently being carried by Kira Schabram (schabram@psu.edu) and Jon Jachimowicz (jjachimowicz@hbs.edu) who would be happy to hear from you.
Modern Team Arrangements
The Modern Team Arrangements Micro Community brings together scholars who study the evolving nature of teamwork in contemporary organizations. We focus on work arrangements that challenge the traditional view of teams as full-time, stable, and clearly bounded. This includes interest in multi-teaming, membership change, virtual/hybrid collaboration, and boundaryless forms of collaboration that span across formal and informal structures. Our shared goal is to understand how these emerging arrangements influence experiences, processes, and outcomes at the individual, team, and organizational levels.
We gather annually at the Academy of Management Meeting for an informal off-site event designed to foster genuine connection, collaboration, and exchange in a relaxed setting. In addition to our AoM meetups, we maintain a listserv to help members stay connected throughout the year, and we are eager to explore off-cycle activities—such as virtual meetups, paper development sessions, or collaborative projects—to continue building our community.
Whether you're just beginning to explore these evolving forms of teamwork or are already deeply engaged in this work, we invite you to join us. We welcome diverse perspectives, interdisciplinary approaches, and methodological triangulation in advancing our understanding of how modern team arrangements shape the experience and outcomes of collaboration in today’s organizational settings.
Interested in Joining?
To learn more about the Modern Team Arrangements Micro Community or to join our mailing list, please contact:
Stefan Berger (s.berger@rug.nl) OR Manuel Vaulont (m.vaulont@northeastern.edu)
New Directions in Gender Research
This micro-community brings together scholars who are pushing the boundaries of gender research within organizational behavior. Building on foundational work that has elucidated the influence of gender on workplace structures, dynamics, and outcomes, this community supports research that expands how gender is conceptualized, studied, and situated in organizational contexts.
Members of this group are advancing gender research by, for example, moving beyond binary, cisgender, and heteronormative frameworks; integrating gendered physiological experiences—such as menstruation, miscarriage, and menopause—into conversations about work; and examining underexplored domains in which gender shapes workplace participation, policy, and perception.
These examples are not meant to be exhaustive. Rather, they reflect the broad and evolving nature of the research being conducted by members of this micro-community. This community is open to a wide range of research questions, methodologies, and theoretical perspectives that deepen our understanding of how gender—and its intersections with other identities—shape organizational life. All in all, this micro-community offers a space for generative, interdisciplinary conversation, collaboration, and support for scholars working to expand the frontiers of gender research in organizational behavior.
If you are interested in joining this micro-community, please email Nitya Chawla at nchawla@umn.edu
Relationships Across Differences (RADs)
The Relationships Across Differences (RADs) micro-community is a coalition of academic scholars and practitioner experts currently co-sponsored by the Wharton School, Harvard Business School, INSEAD, and NYU Stern School of Business. The coalition is dedicated to generating, curating, and disseminating evidence-based insights that advance understanding of how individuals navigate and build effective relationships across differences in organizational contexts. To date, RADs has hosted two in-person academic roundtables aimed at fostering the development of early-stage research for submission to leading management journals. Additionally, the coalition has organized two research-to-practice roundtables—one in person and one virtual—designed to facilitate reciprocal learning between scholars and practitioner experts. Topics addressed in these sessions have included identity, authenticity, inclusive behavior, allyship, emotional experiences, power dynamics, and organizational- or macro-level interventions. Ultimately, RADs aims to develop and mobilize academic research to support the creation of workplace environments in which individuals from all backgrounds experience belonging, thrive professionally, and achieve success.
Please contact Stephanie Creary at sjcreary@wharton.upenn.edu if you are interested in learning about future RADs events.
Social Networks Society
The Social Networks (SNs) Microcommunity is centered around the Social Network Society (SNS), a dynamic and interdisciplinary community of scholars who study how networks of relationships influence individual behavior, group dynamics, organizational functioning, and inter-organizational collaboration. Drawing on traditions in management, sociology, psychology, economics, and computational sciences, we explore the structure, evolution, and impact of social ties. The SNS Microcommunity provides a dedicated platform for AoM members working on network-related questions that span disciplinary and analytical boundaries. In addition to promoting cutting-edge research, the community supports pedagogical innovation and engagement with practice. Through teaching resources, collaborative initiatives, and member-driven events such as the SNS mini-conference and podcast, we offer multiple ways to participate and connect.
You can reach us through our Connect@AOM community page (Social Network Society) or by contacting any of our steering committee members: Fabio Fonti (fabio.fonti@neoma-bs.fr) and/or Jessica Methot (jmethot@smlr.rutgers.edu).
Teams
The Teams Microcommunity, a specialized forum dedicated to advancing scholarly understanding of team dynamics, inputs, processes, and outcomes. This community serves as a collaborative platform for researchers investigating all aspects of teamwork across organizational contexts.
Our Microcommunity brings together scholars from diverse disciplines who share a common interest in team-related phenomena, including team formation, development, leadership, performance, diversity, virtual collaboration, and organizational team structures. We facilitate meaningful exchanges between established researchers and emerging scholars, fostering innovation in theoretical development and methodological approaches.
Whether you're investigating team cognition, multicultural teams, team innovation, conflict resolution, or any other team-related topic, our community offers valuable resources and connections. We welcome quantitative, qualitative, and mixed-methods researchers, as well as those exploring both traditional and emerging team configurations in today's evolving workplace.
The Teams Microcommunity also serves as a bridge between academic research and practical applications, encouraging discussions about how team research can inform organizational practice and policy.
For more information on joining the Teams Microcommunity, feel free to contact us at:
Brad Kirkman: blkirkma@ncsu.edu
Adam Stoverink: astoverink@walton.uark.edu
Trust
The Trust Microcommunity is comprised of scholars and practitioners dedicated to advancing research and dialogue on trust dynamics within and between organizations. Trust is a foundational element in effective organizational functioning that cuts across topics in OB, as well as other divisions within AOM. This community brings together a broad group of people who are interested in exploring how trust is built, maintained, and repaired in diverse workplace contexts. While centered in OB, our focus spans multiple levels of analysis, including interpersonal trust among colleagues/coworkers, trust in leadership, and systemic trust in organizational structures and cultures. We also examine trust across organizational boundaries, such as in strategic alliances, joint ventures, public-private partnerships, and supply chain relationships. The primary aim of the group is to provide the opportunity for trust scholars of all backgrounds and levels of study to connect with others, and thereby facilitating a range of activities, including collaborative research projects, conference symposia, workshops, and publications. Whether you are an established scholar, an active practitioner, or an emerging researcher, we invite you to join our community to share ideas, develop partnerships, and contribute to the evolving discourse on trust in the modern workplace.
To learn more about the Trust Microcommunity, please contact Craig Crossley <ccrossley2@gmail.com>
Work-Nonwork
Are you currently working on—or interested in—research exploring how work and nonwork domains intersect, influence, and reshape one another? Join our Work–Nonwork Microcommunity for a collaborative discussion focused on the evolving interface between employees’ work and nonwork experiences.
This informal yet intellectually engaging space is for scholars passionate about topics such as work-nonwork balance, boundary management, well-being, supportive resources, remote/hybrid work, and related areas.
Our goal is to foster a welcoming and thought-provoking community where we inspire new ideas, reflect upon ongoing research, explore theoretical and methodological challenges, and stay attuned to emerging trends in the field. Whether you’re early in your research journey or further along, all levels of interest are welcome.
If you’re interested in joining or learning more, feel free to contact Yunfeng (Cindy) Chen at chen4028@purdue.edu.
Workplace – Rethinking Where Work Happens
The Workplace Community explores how the spaces where we work (physical, digital, hybrid) shape employee experiences, team collaboration, and organizational outcomes. We connect researchers interested in the design, structure, and meaning of work environments and their influence on behavior, identity, and performance.
Our focus spans flexible offices, remote and hybrid arrangements, and the broader organizational and cultural dynamics of space. Whether you are investigating office design, hybrid coordination, or the psychological experience of remote work, this community offers a space for sharing insights and sparking new collaborations.
To get involved or learn more, contact Ann Sophie at ann_sophie.lauterbach@tu-dresden.de or Amelie Fischer at amelie.fischer@uni-konstanz.de