Eduardo Salas

Eduardo Salas is one of the world’s most cited scholars in the fields of industrial-organizational psychology and human factors. He holds the Allyn R. and Gladys M. Cline Chair in Psychology at Rice University. Salas is the authority on "The Science of Teamwork." Unlike pop-psychology authors who rely on anecdotes, Salas builds his insights on decades of rigorous empirical research funded by organizations like NASA, the U.S. Army, and the FAA. He is the co-author of Teams That Work and has published hundreds of papers on how to turn a group of individuals into a cohesive unit.\n\nSalas is particularly interested in high-reliability organizations—environments where an error can be fatal, such as aviation, healthcare, and the military. He challenges the common "team building" activities (like trust falls) as ineffective, advocating instead for "team training" based on specific competencies like shared mental models, mutual trust, and closed-loop communication. His work has been instrumental in designing safety protocols for medical teams and astronauts. Salas argues that teamwork is not a magical chemistry but a disciplined set of behaviors that can be measured, taught, and practiced. He provides the evidence-based blueprint for collaboration in a complex world.