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Michele Williams is an Assistant Professor of Organizational Behavior at the Industrial and Labor Relations School, Cornell University. She received her PhD in Organizational Behavior from the University of Michigan, her MA in Education from Columbia University and her BA in Psychology from Johns Hopkins University. Before joining the faculty at Cornell in 2006, Professor Williams was a member of the faculty at the Sloan School of Management, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Professor Williams' research focuses on the development of cooperative, high-performance interpersonal relationships, especially on projects involving people from multiple organizations or groups within an organization. Williams' research concentrates on the influences of social network factors and interpersonal processes, such as perspective taking, on how interpersonal trust and cooperation evolve in cross-boundary and team-based relationships.

Williams also has a secondary research interest in the role of emotion in coordinating teams and knowledge work.  Her theoretical work has been published in the Academy of Management Review.

Professor Williams has consulted on effective relationship development and collaboration for public and private organizations such as Booz?Allen & Hamilton and Massachusetts General Hospital. She is also co-author of the Distributed Leadership Assessment—a 360? assessment used by organizations to enhance the leadership potential of managers.