This is an MIT Sloan Management Review article. Technology has enabled people to reconnect easily with networks of contacts that have gone dormant. And it turns out that reconnecting dormant relationships can be extremely useful. In one experiment, advice that executives received from ties that had been dormant for at least three years was as useful, and often even more useful, than the advice they received from current relationships. The big payoffs of dormant ties are that: (1) They are great sources of unexpectedly novel insights, (2) reconnecting is extremely efficient, as it requires a minimal investment of time and (3) reconnecting is not like starting a relationship from scratch. People still have feelings of trust and a shared perspective, which are critical for receiving valuable knowledge from someone. The authors identify and answer "frequently asked questions"about reconnecting dormant ties. One concerns the staying power of relationships once reconnections have occurred. Typically, they conclude, these reconnected relationships do not become fully renewed and maintained, but those who reach out cite the experience as overwhelmingly positive.

In the heat of competition, executives can easily become obsessed with beating their rivals. This adrenaline-fueled emotional state, which the authors call competitive arousal, often leads to bad decisions. Managers can minimize the potential for competitive arousal and the harm it can inflict by avoiding certain types of interaction and targeting the causes of a win-at-all-costs approach to decision making. Through an examination of companies such as Boston Scientific and Paramount, and through research on auctions, the authors identified three principal drivers of competitive arousal: intense rivalry, especially in the form of one-on-one competitions; time pressure, found in auctions and other bidding situations, for example; and being in the spotlight - that is, working in the presence of an audience. Individually, these factors can seriously impair managerial decision making; together, their consequences can be dire, as evidenced by many high-profile business disasters. It's not possible to avoid destructive competitions and bidding wars completely. But managers can help prevent competitive arousal by anticipating potentially harmful competitive dynamics and then restructuring the deal-making process. They can also stop irrational competitive behavior from escalating by addressing the causes of competitive arousal. When rivalry is intense, for instance, managers can limit the roles of those who feel it most. They can reduce time pressure by extending or eliminating arbitrary deadlines. And they can deflect the spotlight by spreading the responsibility for critical competitive decisions among team members. Decision makers will be most successful when they focus on winning contests in which they have a real advantage - and take a step back from those in which winning exacts too high a cost.