Imagine being questioned about complex technical knowledge in front of your peers, supervisors, and members of the public—knowing that a wrong answer could lead to public ridicule. This is the reality ...

Back in the 1980s, stack-ranking employees was seen as a state-of-the-art management practice. CEOs like Jack Welch at GE divided employees into three distinct segments: the top 20% of performers, the ...

Embarrassment, shame, guilt, and humiliation all imply the existence of value systems. Whereas shame and guilt are the outcome of self-appraisal, embarrassment and humiliation are the outcome of ...

Experiencing public humiliation can feel excruciatingly challenging and confidence-crushing, especially for leaders of organizations who thrive on appearing that they have it all together. But as we ...

I must have been about seven years old, a junior in my prep school. I was standing in the dining hall surrounded by over a hundred senior boys and schoolmasters, all looking at me, some with pity, ...

I picked up Stephen Nissenbaum’s The Battle for Christmas a few months ago to read some Christmas history. I found one section in the book pretty disturbing. It describes a late 19th-century activity ...

Tyler Clementi was described as quiet and shy, perhaps lacking the mental toughness to deal with the humiliation of having his sex life put on display. The Rutgers University freshman jumped off the ...

“It was a wardrobe malfunction.” – Performer Justin Timberlake, explaining the 2004 Superbowl breast baring incident that resulted in public outrage and a $550,000 FCC fine on CBS (voided by the ...