Robin Pinkley

Professor
Janet and Craig Duchossois Endowed Professorship in Management and Organizations
Program Director, Master of Science in Management

PhD, Psychology, University of North Carolina

Management and Organizations

View CV

  • Bio

    Dr. Robin L. Pinkley is the Janet and Craig Duchossois Endowed Professor of Management and Organizations at the Edwin L. Cox School of Business at Southern Methodist University (SMU), where she previously served as chairman of the Organizational Behavior Department and director of the American Airlines Center for Labor Relations and Conflict Resolution.  Dr. Pinkley is the founder of the M2M (Master to Master) Center for Profitable Negotiation, focusing on negotiation research, training, consulting, and deal-making.  She previously served as visiting professor of organizational behavior at the J. L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University.  Dr. Pinkley received a PhD in social psychology from the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill.

    Dr. Pinkley has been a frequent speaker in management development programs and a negotiation consultant for corporate and government organizations in nine countries.  A sample of her clients include Accenture, Allstate Insurance, ARCO, Banc-Tec Inc., Blue Cross Blue Shield of Florida, Bush Institute, Chase Paymentech, DFB Holding Company, DPT Laboratories, Freeman, General Electric, Generational Equity, Jones Lang LaSalle, JP Morgan Chase, Kodak, Legacy Bank, Lockheed Martin Vought, Macy’s, Maxim Integrated Products, Mobil, NASA, Physician’s Leadership Association of America, Pioneer Natural Resources, Reliant Energy, Remington Hotel Corporation, Samson Investment Company, SBC Communications, Sewell Motor Company, Solidus Technologies, 7-Eleven, Sony Ericsson, State Farm Insurance, Staubach Real Estate Company, Southwest Airlines, Southwestern Bell Company, Strasburger & Price LLP, Tandem Computers, Targetbase Marketing Consultants, Taylor Publishing, Telmar Network Technologies, Texas Children’s Hospital, Unilever, Warner Brothers, and Yahoo!  Dr. Pinkley is a member of the board of directors for Solidus Technologies and NW Leadership Society.

    A subset of Dr. Pinkley’s media coverage includes interviews on CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, Marketplace Radio (NPR); quotes in newspapers such as the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Chicago Tribune, Washington Post, Dallas Morning News, LA Times, USA Today; and quotes in magazines such as US News and World Report, Money Magazine, Fortune Magazine, Kiplinger’s Personal Finance Magazine, Redbook, Working Mother, Woman’s Day, Ladies Home Journal, and D Magazine.

    Dr. Pinkley was the president for the International Association of Conflict Management.  She served as a chairman of the Conflict Management Division of the Academy of Management, as well as member-at-large and program chair.  She was also an associate editor of the International Journal of Conflict Management.

    Dr. Pinkley is co-author (along with Greg Northcraft) of “Get Paid What You're Worth: The Expert Negotiators Guide to Salary and Compensation”.  She is also the author or co-author of articles on negotiation and managerial conflict resolution, which appear in the Academy of Management Journal, Academy of Management Review, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Journal of Applied Psychology, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, and the International Journal of Conflict Management.

    Dr. Pinkley is the creator of the Gain-Gain Approach to Profitable Negotiation.  Her research focuses on the sources and consequences of negotiator power, the use of strategic anchors for enhancing opponent perceptions of negotiated value, and the strategic application of “value context theory".  This research has earned Dr. Pinkley the "Edwin L. Cox 1994 Outstanding Researcher Award", a Frank and Susan Dunlevy Faculty Research Fellowship, a Corrigan Fellowship, a Dorothy Cullum Fellowship, and a Marilyn & Leo F. Corrigan Junior Faculty Endowment.  She is also the recipient of SMU's "Golden Mustang Award" for innovative teaching and the "Carl Sewell Distinguished Service to the Community Award".

  • Teaching

    MNO 6215 Master Negotiation

  • Research

    Gain-Gain Approach to Profitable Negotiation
    Negotiator Power
    Meaning as Value in Negotiation
    Gender and the Assertion Myth in Gender and Leadership
    Strategic Bidding in Negotiation

  • Select Publications

    Tuncel, E., Mislin, A., Kesebir, S., & Pinkley, R. L., (in press) Agreement Attraction and Impasse Aversion: Motives for Selecting a Poor Deal Over No Deal at All. Psychological Science

    Conlon, D., Pinkley, R. L. & Sawyer, J. (2014) Getting Something Out of Nothing: Reaping or Resisting the Power of a Phantom BATNA. In Ayoko, O. B., Ashkanasy, N. M., & Jehn, K. E. (Eds.). Handbook of Conflict Management Research, Edward Edgar Publishing, UK. Chapter 20, pg. 328 – 342.

    Pinkley, R. L., Sawyer, J, Conlon, D., & Sleesman, D. (In preparation for submission to JAP). Forms of communication in dyadic negotiation: How what you say impacts real and illusions of power, social proof, scarcity and outcome.

    Turan, N., & Pinkley, R. L. (In preparation for JPSP and was presented at the International Association for Conflict Management Conference, 2015). The strategic use of arguments in first offers: Advice concerning anchors, accounts and how to share them.

    Bear, J., Pinkley, R. L., & Barsness, Z. (Presented at the International Association for Conflict Management Conference, 2015). The gendered path to negotiation expertise: Perceptions regarding where to go and the path for getting there.