It is with deepest sorrow that we announce the peaceful passing of our beloved Professor Dean William Tjosvold on June 5 in Minneapolis at the age of 81.

Professor Tjosvold grew up in Minneapolis as the youngest of three children. He was captain of his high school basketball team and went on to study history at Princeton University. He later earned his Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota, beginning a distinguished academic career that would span decades and continents.

Professor Tjosvold made significant and lasting contributions to the fields of cooperation and competition, conflict management, leadership, and management in China, where he developed numerous scholarly collaborations. An internationally recognized authority on cooperative teamwork and constructive conflict, he served as Elected President of the International Association for Conflict Management (1992–1994), as Associate Editor of the International Journal of Conflict Management (1988–1990), and as an Elected Member of the Board of Governors of the Academy of Management (2004–2007), along with many other academic distinctions.

He taught at Pennsylvania State University and Simon Fraser University, and served as a visiting professor at the National University of Singapore, the University of Groningen in the Netherlands, the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, the City University of Hong Kong, and Lingnan University, Hong Kong.

In 1992, Simon Fraser University awarded him a University Professorship in recognition of his outstanding research contributions. In 1998, he received the American Educational Research Association’s Outstanding Contribution to Cooperative Learning Award. His review of cooperative and competitive conflict was recognized as the Best Article in Applied Psychology: An International Review in 1998. He also received several outstanding paper awards from the International Association of Conflict Management.

Professor Dean Tjosvold made systematic and far-reaching contributions to the development of Chinese management research. Since 1990s, he introduced and rigorously applied the theories of cooperation and competition, constructive conflict, and goal interdependence to the Chinese context, conducting extensive empirical studies in organizations across Mainland China and Hong Kong. Many of his most influential publications were deeply grounded in Chinese enterprises, government agencies, and cross-border collaborations. His work examined how cultural factors—such as guanxi, face, power distance, and collectivist values—shape conflict management, leadership relationships, and team effectiveness. Through these studies, he not only tested and extended foundational Western theories within the Chinese context, but also advanced cross-cultural management theory more broadly. At the same time, his research provided practical guidance for organizational transformation, team development, and leadership enhancement in Chinese organizations.

Professor Tjosvold devoted himself to the Chinese scholarly community for decades, mentoring a large number of doctoral students and young scholars in Mainland China and Hong Kong. He built close and enduring collaborations with local academics and actively promoted the internationalization of Chinese management research through joint projects, international publications, and global conferences. Today, many of his former students and collaborators have become leading scholars and central figures in the fields of Chinese management and organizational behavior. His impact on Chinese management research is reflected not only in his extensive and high-quality body of scholarship, but also in the generations of scholars he nurtured. He leaves a profound and enduring legacy for the internationalization and theoretical advancement of Chinese management research.

Professor Tjosvold published more than 200 journal articles, over 20 books, 30 book chapters, and more than 100 conference papers. Several of his books were co-authored with his sister Mary. His work on teamwork, leadership, and conflict management was widely influential, including books published in Chinese for readers in China. One of his books on the psychology of leadership was selected by W. Edwards Deming as a must-read for leaders. His books were chosen by Fortune, Business Week, Newbridge, and Executive Book Clubs, and were translated into Chinese and Spanish. He served as Associate Editor of the Journal of Organizational Behavior and Asian Editor of the Journal of World Business, and sat on the editorial boards of leading journals including the Academy of Management Review, Journal of International Business Studies, Journal of Management, and Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology. He was also a partner in his family’s Minnesota-based health care business, which employs 700 people.

Beyond his extraordinary academic achievements, Dean was a devoted family man. He was enormously proud of his children. After his first three children returned to the United States for college one by one, after his retirement in 2015 he remained in Hong Kong for several years so that he could watch his youngest daughter play rugby for the Hong Kong national women’s team. Throughout his life, he maintained a close and loving relationship with his extended family in Minnesota, where he spent every summer.

Dean loved exercise and maintained his fitness by swimming and biking almost daily, and by playing basketball “with a group of old men” every Sunday for many years. His energy, discipline, warmth, and humor touched everyone who knew him.

Beyond his professional life, Professor Tjosvold and his family were generous supporters of students, colleagues, and communities. They built schools in Africa and donated scholarships to Lingnan University, leaving a lasting legacy of generosity, compassion, and care.

He will be deeply missed by all of us.

We warmly invite you to share your stories, memories, and tributes along with group photos via email at sharon2021ky@gmail.com. We will compile and share them at a later time.

Our deepest condolences to his family and loved ones.