Bio
Prof. Frese holds appointments at Asia Business School (Malaysia) and Leuphana University of Lueneburg (Germany) and a visiting appointment (former Head of Dept. and Provost chair) at NUS Business School. Prior appointments were at NUS, at University of Giessen (chair for work and organizational psychology) and visitng professor at London Business School; professorial appointments also at University of Bremen, at University of Pennsylvania, at LMU (Munich) and at UvA (Amsterdam). He lectured internationally – as visiting professor in the USA (e.g., Maryland, Michigan State), Sweden, Zimbabwe, Brazil, China (Zheijang Univ), Uganda (continuous visiting professor at Markerere University Business School), and elsewhere. Prof. Frese was a student at Univ of Regensburg (BA=Vorplom), Free University of Berlin (Diploma = MSc) and Technical University Berlin (PhD).
Prof. Frese’s research spans a wide range of basic and applied topics within organizational behavior and work psychology. Most important are his longitudinal studies on psychological effects of unemployment, impact of stress at work, predictors of personal initiative, as well as psychological success factors of entrepreneurs. His field studies on errors, error management, and error management culture have received wide attention. He is also studying training - most importantly the concept of error management training, leadership training and training to improve entrepreneurial success and personal initiative. He studies cultural factors in organization and across nations, as well as success factors in entrepreneurs in developing countries (Africa, Latin America, and Asia). He is known for his (cross-national) research on innovation, most recentlty innovation processes in Asia.
Frese has authored 170 peer reviewed journal articles (in amongst other journals SCIENCE, AMJ, JAP, PP, AMLE, JPSP, JBV, ROB, JOB, JVB, JOOP, and APIR) and ca 250 book chapters, etc, and was editor/author of ca 30 books and special issues. A recent SCIENCE articls provides the results of a ramdomized controlled experiment of his training concept of Personal Initiative for Entrepreneurs. His edited books include Goal-Directed Behavior: The Concept of Action in Psychology, Psychological Issues of Human-Computer Interaction in the Work Place, Successful Entrepreneurs: Psychological Analyses and Practical Suggestions for Entrepreneurs in East and West Germany (German and Russian), Success and failure of microbusiness owners in Africa: A psychological approach, The Psychology of Entrepreneurship (SIOP Organizational Frontiers Series), and Errors in Organizations (SIOP Organizational Frontiers Series), The Psychology of Planning in Organizations: Research and Applications (Routledge), Gielnik, M. M. Frese, M., Cardon, M (Eds). (2021).
Awards: He received several university best scholar as well as best paper awards; he was also elected as Fellow by the German Academy of Sciences (Leopoldina); he is Fellow in the following organizations: Academy of Management, Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (Division 14 of APA), Association for Psychological Science, and International Association of Applied Psychology. In 2015 he received the Distinguished Scientific Contributions Award by SIOP and the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management Greif award for the most influential entrepreneurship publication of the last 6 years (ETP, 2009). In 2016 he received the Distinguished Career Contributions Award of the German Psychological Association (Leipzig), the Dedication to Entrepreneurship Award by the Entrepreneurship division of the Academy of Management (Anaheim), the 2016 Emerald Africa Academy of Management Trailblazer Award (Nairobi, Kenya); later he received the2018 Distinguished Scientific Contributions Award of the International Association of Applied Psychology (Montreal), the 2020 Path-to-Scale Award by Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-lab, MIT), and the 2021 Life Time Achievement Award of Organizational Behavior Division, Academy of Management.
Ranked third in life time publications among German management professors (BWL-Handelsblatt-Rankings 2012, 2014) and among the five most cited economists in Germany (Scopus Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung Ranking on Research 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2020, 2021 - the German term economist includes management), he is the most frequently cited work and organizational psychologist and organizational behavior scientist in Germany and Asia and one of the most frequently cited Europeans (h-index =114; ca 69,000 Google Scholar citations with 16 articles cited more than 1000 times; i10=280; Web of Science: ca 15,500 cites, h=60, with two papers being in the top 1% of the field (2018); Scopus: ca 21,000; h=66). He belongs to the 15 most frequently cited active scholars in Management, Organizational Behavior, and Entrepreneurship and Work Psychology worldwide (Google) and the 2% best researchers in 2020 and 2021 Stanford Ranking by Ioannidis et al.Prof. Frese presented approx.. 90 invited congress keynote addresses, e.g., at ICP in San Francisco (1998), Stockholm (2000), Athens (2006), Melbourne (2010), BPS Occupational Psychology, Chester (2013) and Paris ICAP (2014), APS (2017), Montreal ICAP (2018), AoM, on-line (2021).
He currently serves on the following editorial boards of journals: Academy of Management Journal, Journal of Applied Psychology, Applied Psychology: An International Review, Applied Psychology: Health and Well-Being; Journal of Business and Psychology, Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior. Prof. Frese served as field editor of Journal of Business Venturing – the most important entrepreneurship journal (until end of 2016). He was editor of the journal Applied Psychology: An International Review, Co-Editor of Psychologische Rundschau, and was on the editorial board of various book series (e.g., Management Series (Routledge)). He was President of the International Association of Applied Psychology and headed the division Work and Organizational Psychology of German Society for Psychology. In 2020, he was elected to be on the Board of Directors of GLOBE (Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior Effectiveness).
His research was supported by research grants (from 20 000 to a few million Euros) from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, the German government, Volkswagenstiftung, European Union, Nederlandse Wetenschap Organisatie, Mercedes-Benz, Opel, and Accenture, Ministry of Education and SSRC in Singapore, UNESCO, DAAD, World Bank, and other science supporting organizations. He also served as consultant and lecturer to the management of many companies (e.g., banking, technology, automobile, utility, telecommunication, industry, with more than 500 talks given and consulting jobs done).
Recognition & Awards
- Responsible Research in Management Inaugural IACMR President Award, International Association for Chinese Management Research - 2018
- IAAP Distinguished Scientific Contributions Award, International Association of Applied Psychology (International Congress of Applied Psychology, Montreal) - 2018
- Hogan Award for Personality and Performance, Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology Conference (article by Li, Fay, Frese, Harms & Gao in Journal of Applied Psychology, 2014) - 2016
- Emerald Africa Academy of Management Trailblazer Award, 3rd Biennial Conference, Nairobi, Kenya, - 2016
- Greif Award, Most impactful entrepreneurship publication in 2009 (awarded in the Academy of Management Meeting, Vancouver - 2015
- Best Researcher Award, Leuphana University - 2015
- Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award, Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP) - 2015
- Best Reviewer Award, Academy of Management Journal (awarded at the Academy of Management Meeting, Vancouver) - 2015
- Falcone Distinguished Entrepreneurship Scholar Award, Outstanding contributions for entrepreneurship thought and practice (awarded by the program in Entrepreneurship & Emerging Entrepreneurship & Emering Enterprises, Martin J. Whitman School of Management, Syracuse University, New York - 2013
- Outstanding Researcher Award, Leuphana Forschungspreis - 2012
- University Award (second place), Most highly cited researcher of the Leuphana University - 2012
- Faculty Outstanding Researcher Award (NUS) - 2012
- Best Reviewer Award Entrepreneurship, Theory and Practice - 2011
Educational Qualifications
- Ph.D, Technical University of Berlin, Germany, 1978
- Diplom (Dipl.-Psych.), Free University of Berlin, Germany, 1976
- Vordiplom, University of Regensburg, Germany, 1971
Academic Experience
- Tenured Professor, NUS Business School, National University of Singapore, 2009 - current
- Visiting Professor, Makerere, University of Business School, Kampala, Uganda, 2009 - current
- Tenured Professor, Luephana Universit of Leuneburg, Germany, 2009 - current
- Additional Adjunct Professor, University of Pennsylvania, 1984 - current
- Visiting Professor (part-time), London Business School, 1999 - 2009
- Chair for Work and Organizational Psychology, University of Giessen, 1991 - 2009
- Visiting Professor (sabbatical), Michigan State University, 2003 - 2004
- Visiting Professor (sabbatical), University of Maryland, 2003
- Visiting Professor, Zheijang University, China, 2000
- Chair for Work and Organizational Psychology, University of Amsterdam, 1995 - 2000
- Tenured Professor, Department of Psychology, University of Munich, 1984 - 1991
- Visiting Professor, University of Mannheim, 1989 - 1990
- Visiting Professor, Pennsylvania State University, 1988 - 1989