In Memoriam: Dr. Michael A. Gross
Written by Wendi L. Adair
Dr. Michael A. Gross, conflict management scholar, enthusiastic teacher, volunteer extraordinaire, and friend to many IACMers, passed away on July 25, 2026, at the age of 63. Michael was an active participant and friendly face at the annual IACM conference since 1998. What you might not know is that Michael wore many IACM hats over the years, contributing to a myriad of functions in our association. A dedicated teacher, researcher, and friend, Michael will be remembered for his humility, generosity, authenticity, and passion.
Michael’s IACM service began in 2006, when he served on both the Best Published Article Committee and the IACM Logo Committee. I was also on the logo committee and remember several intense yet lighthearted brainstorming sessions drafting the letters to represent a bridge before we ultimately decided on two sides of the letter C coming together bringing conflict to collaboration.
In 2006, Michael also became Editor of Signal, the IACM newsletter, a position he held until 2008. Michael continued to serve regularly on award committees for our association, including the IACM Best Dissertation Award (2007), IACM Outstanding Article Award (2008, 2012, 2014, 2022-24), IACM Outstanding Conference Paper Award (2009), IACM Best Book Award (2022), and IACM Early Career Award (2023). Serving on an award committee demands 10-25 hours, time that Michael generously gave to recognize and celebrate the accomplishments of his IACM colleagues.
Michael held multiple leadership positions in IACM and helped establish Negotiation and Conflict Management Research (NCMR) as a premier conflict management journal. Michael was NCMR Editor-in-Chief from 2015 to 2019 and then served as Advising Editor 2020-2024. During his tenure as Editor, Michael organized a conference session and co-authored a piece on NCMR’s First Decade: An Empirical Examination, with Eric Neuman and me. True to his spirit of lifting others up, Michael solo authored Legacies of Scholars, Scholarship, and Praxis From IACM: Celebrating a Lifetime of Achievements (2016) and Transforming Society from Theory to Practice: Celebrating the Achievements of Rubin Award Recipients from IACM (2018). Michael was an elected Representative-at-Large to IACM’s Executive Board of Directors (2013-2015) and served on the Board for two years as Editor of Signal (2006-2008) and four years as Editor of NCMR (2015-2019).
Michael was a passionate, devoted teacher who loved creating opportunities for students to learn and develop. As NCMR Editor, Michael hosted a Meet the Editors panel (2019) and a session on Teaching Negotiation to Undergraduates (2010). Michael joined Deborah Cai, Laura Rees, Jennifer Parlamis, and Ming-Hong Tsai to bring the Three-Minute Thesis Competition to our annual meetings (2022-2025). Michael also worked with Deb, Laura, Jen, and Ming to host the annual IACM/CMD Doctoral Student Workshop, beginning in 2022. I witnessed Michael as teacher on a project when he guided two students through the process of open and narrative coding with wisdom, patience, encouragement, and support (Adair et al., 2025). Michael was the recipient of three Outstanding Teacher awards at his home institution, Colorado State University. And, Michael’s commitment to service extended beyond IACM to his Department of Management at Colorado State University where he received the Outstanding Service Award three times.
At the IACM annual meetings, Michael regularly brought together scholars for roundtables, novel sessions, and cutting-edge dialogue bridging science and practice. I had the pleasure of participating in two of these sessions, Making Space for Indigenous Voices in Conflict Management Science and Practice (2021) and Wicked Societal Problems that Challenge our Collective Future (2021). He helped organize a research incubator on Counterproductive Work Behaviors (2014), a session on Publishing Qualitative Research (2014), and a joint senior/junior scholar session on Mentoring and the Nuances of Publication Success (2017).
A communication scholar by training, Michael joined the faculty of Colorado State University’s Department of Management in 2000. Michael contributed to our understanding of conflict management with publications on conflict style (Gross & Guerrero, 2000) and conflict strategy and communication competence (Gross et al., 2004). He was truly gifted at qualitative methods and thematic analysis, as can be seen in his papers on crying in the workplace (Becker et al., 2018) and experience design (Gross & Pullman, 2012).
Michael was all of this and so much more. A detailed memoriam written by Michael’s family is available at Michael A. Gross in Memoriam. Michael’s many contributions to IACM are matched with similar service and innovations for the Academy of Management’s Conflict Management Division (CMD) (2 Outstanding Service awards, Division Chair (5-year leadership cycle, 2012-2016), Doctoral Student Consortium (2017, 2019), Junior Faculty Research Incubator (2018, 2020), Website Manager (2005-2008), and Representative-at-Large (2004-2006). When Michael and I were Reps-at-Large, along with Susan Brodt we helped create and deliver the first annual Academy-wide “Negotiating your first job” professional development workshop for PhD students (2005). CMD continues to offer this session, now in its 26th year, training graduate students across management fields for employment negotiation. Michael was a visiting scholar at Columbia University, the University of Waterloo, the Smith School of Business at Queen’s University, and London Business School, and most recently at the time of his passing he was CMD’s Scholar in Residence.
Michael, along with Deb, Laura, Jennifer, and Ming, created a podcast series in 2020 called Negotiation and Conflict Management (NaC): Creating Value Through Better Connections. Through two series, Article to Audio and I’m Glad I Know that Now!, and more than 50 episodes, NaC continues to bring stories of conflict management research and application to an international audience of students, scholars, and practitioners.
I like to imagine Michael smiling at the many IACMers reading this article and thinking “I’m glad I know that now!” about Michael himself.
Donations honoring Michael and recognizing his passion for helping students can be made to the CSU College of Business Scholarship Fund CSU Scholarship Fund. Please note that there is an opportunity to designate your donation in Michael’s honor after you click through and pay.
