Marlys Christianson

Started Fall 2003

email:  mkchrist at bus.umich.edu
Advisors:  Kathleen Sutcliffe

Personal Web Site

Program

Management and Organizations

Dissertation:  Updating in the Emergency Department: How Healthcare Providers Revisit and Potentially Revise their Understanding of a Patient's Changing Medical Condition

Research Interests:

I am interested in how individuals organize to accomplish complex, interdependent work, particularly in dynamic, ambiguous, or high-hazard contexts.  My research examines the ways in which organizing practices influence key organizational outcomes -- such as adaptation, learning, or reliability -- both in terms of desired outcomes as well as unintended consequences or trade-offs.

Publications

Refereed Articles:

Christianson, M.K., Farkas, M., Sutcliffe, K.M., & Weick, K.E.  Learning through rare events: Significant interruptions at the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Museum.  (Forthcoming in Organization Science).

Grant, A.M., Christianson, M.K., & Price, R.H.  2007.  Happiness, health, or relationships? Managerial practices and employee well-being tradeoffs.  Academy of Management Perspectives, 21:51-63.

Blatt, R., Christianson, M.K., Sutcliffe, K.M., and Rosenthal, M.M.  2006.  A sensemaking lens on reliability.  Journal of Organizational Behavior, 27:897-917.

Anderson, P.J.J., Blatt, R., Christianson, M.K., Grant, A.M., Marquis, C., Neuman, E.J., Sonenshein, S., & Sutcliffe, K.M.  2006. Understanding mechanisms in organizational research: Reflections from a collective journey.  Journal of Management Inquiry, 15: 102-113.

Book Chapters:

Christianson, M.K., & Sutcliffe, K.M.  Sensemaking, high reliability organizing, and resilience.  Forthcoming in P. Croskerry, K. Crosby, S. Schenkel, & R.L. Wears (Eds.), Patient Safety in Emergency Medicine.

Ashford, S.J., Sutcliffe, K.M., & Christianson, M.K. Leadership, voice, and silence.  Forthcoming in Greenberg, J., Edwards. M.S., & C.T. Brinsfeld (Eds.), Voice and Silence in Organizations.

Awards

2007-2008 Rackham Predoctoral Fellowship (University of Michigan)

2007 Outstanding Reviewer (Organizational Behavior Division), Academy of Management

2006-2007 Gerald and Lillian Dykstra Fellowship (Ross School of Business)
Awarded for excellence in teaching

2005-2006 Thomas William Leabo Memorial Award (Ross School of Business)
Awarded to a third year doctoral student at the Ross School of Business for academic achievement

Grants

2003-2006 Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan Foundation Student Award Program Grant ($3000)
(PI: M. Christianson, Co-PIs: S. Kronick, MD and K. Sutcliffe, Ph.D) "Observing 'work in progress': Relational and contextual factors that enable physicians to revisit and potentially revise a working diagnosis."

2003-2005 Quality of Life Interdisciplinary Forum Grant ($8761)
Received grant to co-found University of Michigan Rackham interdisciplinary workshop that brought together graduate students and professors in order to better understand the nature of, and influences on, human well-being.

Teaching

Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan
MO 300 Behavioral Theory in Management, Winter 2006 (required BBA core course, 70 undergraduates)
Evaluation 4.9/5.0

Refereed Conference Papers and Invited Presentations

National Academy of Management Meeting (2008).  Anaheim, CA:

• Organizing PDW (with Michelle Barton):  "Studying complex interdependent work: A methodological toolkit" (presenters include Curtis LeBaron, David Obstfeld, Mary Waller, and J. Stuart Bunderson).

National Academy of Management Meeting (2007).  Philadelphia, PA:

• Presented "'Aha' and 'Oops': The role of surprise in updating," as part of a symposium on organizational surprise.

National Academy of Management Meeting (2006).  Atlanta, GA:

• Organized Symposium (with Michelle Barton): "Organizational resilience: A social mechanisms perspective."
• Presented "Making sense of the patient's symptoms: Resilient organizing in the emergency department."
• Co-organized Professional Development Workshop (with Modupe Akinola, Jane Dutton, Mary Ann Glynn, Karen Golden-Biddle, Dan Gruber, Naomi Rothman, Kathleen Sutcliffe): "Learning about resilience: Research, teaching, and professional aspiration."

National Academy of Management Meeting (2005).  Honolulu, HI:

• Organized Symposium (with Kathleen Sutcliffe): "Building capabilities: Reconceptualizing organizational resources."
• Presented "Organizing to increase mindful interaction: Lessons from healthcare" (with Kathleen Sutcliffe).
• Presented "Tradeoffs in well-being at work: Toward an integrated understanding" (with Adam Grant and Rick Price).
• Presented "An empirical examination of thriving at work" (with Gretchen Spreitzer, Kathleen Sutcliffe, and Adam Grant).

National Academy of Management Meeting (2004). New Orleans, LA:

• Organized Symposium (with Ruth Blatt and Kathleen Sutcliffe): "Remaining silent: The challenges to voice in dynamic settings."

• Presented "Relational Dynamics of Silence and Voice: Lessons from Medical Errors" (with Ruth Blatt and Kathleen Sutcliffe)

Positive Organizational Scholarship Conference (2003), Ann Arbor, MI:

• POS 101: Defining a discipline

Service

Health Care Management Division PhD Student Representative (Academy of Management), 2006-2008.

Ph.D. Forum, Stephen M. Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan, President, 2005-2006.

Co-organizer (with Kathleen Sutcliffe and Dan Gruber) of the 2005 Resilience Conference, Ann Arbor, MI.

Educational Background

MD, University of Saskatchewan, Canada

Work Experience

1998-2003, Family Physician, Rochester, MN