Dr. Maritza Salazar Campo

TEAM SCIENCE RESEARCHER & LEADERSHIP SCHOLAR

Tenured Associate Professor of Organization & Management, UC Irvine, and creator of Integrative Capacity, a research-backed framework for leading complex scientific teams.

For over a decade, with funding from the NIH and NSF, I’ve studied what separates high-performing research teams from stalled ones. I translate that science into the frameworks, courses, and coaching that help research leaders align expertise, move decisions forward, and deliver under pressure.

Integrative Capacity is a team's ability to connect its existing expertise. Most research teams don't fail for lack of talent; they fail because there's no system linking a molecular biologist's insight to a clinician's question to a statistician's method. Integrative Capacity is the set of structures, routines, and leadership practices that turn a collection of experts into a team that actually thinks together.

I started doing this work as a doctoral student after being invited to work with teams at the Langone School of Medicine. It was there when I saw how having the “right” people in the room was only the beginning. Great teams were working together differently, and having observed over 100 hours of interaction, I was starting to see clear patterns.

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Recognized & funded by the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health.

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What Makes My Approach Different

Most leadership advice for scientists is generic management training in a lab coat. My work is built on peer-reviewed research into how research teams specifically succeed and fail, and on more than a decade of federally funded study of real teams under real pressure. I don't teach personality fixes or communication platitudes; I help you build the structures that make integration happen by design. Everything I offer traces back to the same core idea: talent is rarely the problem; the system connecting that talent almost always is.

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My Team Science Research

My peer-reviewed research spans the questions that shape how scientific teams perform

My Google Scholar Page

On Leading a Lab (National Academies)

    • Salazar, M., Lant, T., Gibson, C., & Slyngstad, D. (in progress). Perspective Integration Capability: Unlocking the Innovation Potential of Expertise-Diverse Teams.

    • Salazar, M. R., & Lant, T. K. (2018). Facilitating Innovation in Interdisciplinary Teams: The Role of Leaders and Integrative Communication. Informing Science, 21, 157-178.

    • Salazar, M., Lant, T., Fiore, S., Salas, E. (2012). Integrative Capacity: A New Perspective for Understanding Interdisciplinary Team Processes and Outcomes. Small Group Research, DOI: 10.1177/1046496412453622.

    • Grossman, R., Campo, M. S., Feitosa, J., & Salas, E. (2021). Cross-cultural perspectives on collaboration: Differences between the Middle East and the United States. Journal of Business Research, 129, 2-13.

    • Salazar, M. & Salas, E. (2013). Reflection of Cross-Cultural Collaboration Science. Journal of Organizational Behavior. Vol. 34, pp. 910-917. DOI: 10.1002/job.1881.

    • Feitosa, J., Grossman, R., & Salazar, M. (2018). Debunking key assumptions about teams: The role of culture. American Psychologist, 73(4), 376-389.

    • Salas, E., Salazar, M., & Gelfand, M. (2012). Understanding Culture as Diversity. In Q. Roberson (Eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Diversity and Work. (pp. 31-51). Oxford: Oxford Press.

    • Báez, A., et al., (2023). Impact of COVID-19 on the Research Career Advancement of Health Equity Scholars from Diverse Backgrounds. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 20(6), 4750.

    • Mubasher, M., et al. (2023). The Role of Mock Reviewing Sessions in the National Research Mentoring Network Strategic Empowerment Tailored for Health Equity Investigators: A Randomized Controlled Study. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 20(9), 5738.

    • Mubasher, et al., (2021). Randomized Controlled Study to Test the Effectiveness of Developmental Network Coaching in the Career Advancement of Diverse Early-Stage Investigators (ESIs): Implementation Challenges and Lessons Learned. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 18(22), 12003.

    • Pruitt, B. L., et al.,(2023). Insights from an AIMBE Workshop: Diversifying Paths to Academic Leadership. Biomedical Engineering Education, 1-14.

    • Benson, G. S., McIntosh, C. K., Salazar, M., & Vaziri, H. (2020). Cultural values and definitions of career success. Human Resource Management Journal, 30(3), 392-421.

    • Campo, M. S., et al., (2023). Formative Evaluation of a Student Symptom Decision Tree for COVID-19. Health behavior and policy review, 10(1), 1140-1152.

    • Bisbey, T. M., Wooten, K. C., Campo, M. S., Lant, T. K., & Salas, E. (2021). Implementing an evidence-based competency model for science team training and evaluation: TeamMAPPS. Journal of Clinical and Translational Science, 5(1).

    • Alvarez, S., Salazar Campo, M, LaBeaud, D. (2022) Team Science and Infectious Disease Work: Exploring Opportunities and Challenges. Stewart Ibarra, A. & LaBeaud, D., In Infection Disease Work in a Changing World: People, Pathogens and Partnerships. Springer, 2022.

    • Sonesh, S., Gregory, M., Hughes, A., Feitosa, J, Benishek, L, Verhoeven, D, Patzer, B, Salazar, M., Gonzalez, L. Salas, E. (2015) Team Training in Obstetrics: A multi-level evaluation. Family, Systems, and Health.

    • Salazar, M. R., Feitosa, J., & Salas, E. (2017). Diversity and team creativity: Exploring underlying mechanisms. Group Dynamics: Theory, Research, and Practice, 21(4), 187-206.

    • Salazar, M. Mohammed, S. & Schulz, M. (in progress). More creative when we work together? The influence of temporal orientation diversity and shard temporal cognition in teams.

    • Salazar, M., Okhuysen, G., and Heejin, K., (in progress). Searching for a Cure: The Role of Scaffolding Interventions in Scientific Collaborations.

    • Salazar, M., Doiron, K., Widmer, K, and Lant, K. (2019). Leader integrative capabilities: A catalyst for effective inter-disciplinary teams. Hall, K., Vogel, A. and Croyle, R. Advancing Social and Behavioral Health Research through Cross-Disciplinary Team Science: Principles for Success. Cham, Switzerland: Springer, 2019 (pp. 313-328).

    • Slyngstad, D., DeMichele, A., Salazar, M. (2016) Team performance in knowledge work. In Eduardo Salas, Rico, Ramon, Neal Ashkanasy, Jonathon Passmore (Eds), The Wiley Handbook of Psychology of Team Working and Collaborative Processes. Malden, MA: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. (pg. 43-72).

    • Salas, E., Salazar, M. Feitosa, J., & Kramer, W. (2013) Collaboration and Conflict in Work Teams. The Oxford Handbook of Organizational Climate and Culture. Oxford: Oxford Press

    • Salazar, M., Sengupta, P., Kim, H., Chung, B., Ledford, G. & Schneider, B. (In progress). Team Recovery and Performance: The Role of Team Engagement and Team Burnout

    • Chung, B., Ledford, G. & Schneider, Salazar, M. (in progress) Job characteristics and transformational leadership effects on well-being and subsequent outcomes.

    • Vaziri, H., Benson, G. S., & Salazar Campo, M. (2019). Hardworking coworkers: A multilevel cross‐national look at group work hours and work–family conflict. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 20 (6), pp. 676-692.

Trusted by leading organizations to align priorities and drive progress for their teams and organizations.

  • The image features the logo of PWC, a professional services network, with the company's name and a stylized geometric sailboat icon above it.
  • Stanford University School of Medicine logo with shield emblem and text.
  • Seal of Orange County Department of Education featuring a bell and a flowing river with the text "Orange County Department of Education" encircling the image.
  • Logo of Devcom, a gaming and development conference, featuring a stylized
  • QTC logo with enclosed oval and horizontal lines extending to the right
  • CedarSaini logo with interconnected circles and the text 'CedarSaini'
  • Logo with three stylized human figures holding hands and the text 'NRMN'.
  • Children's National logo featuring a bear holding a stethoscope.
  • Experian logo on a black background
  • UCLA Health logo with a black background and the text 'UCLA Health' in dark blue.
  • J.P. Morgan logo in black and navy blue.
  • Kia logo with red text inside an oval shape on a black background.
  • Stylized purple eye logo with curved lines and abstract shapes.
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The problem I built my work around

Nothing failed scientifically. The team structure failed the science.

This is an Integrative Capacity problem. Teams have the expertise. They lack the systems to connect it.

I built this framework around that gap because nobody else was naming it directly. Most research development starts with credentials. Mine starts with creating the conditions that let expertise actually function.

That work has taken me from Stanford to NYU's Stern School of Business, where I studied team performance, and eventually to UCI's Merage School of Business, where I translate research into curriculum, coaching, and the framework you see here.

The projects below are where that evidence continues to grow. I built each one with PIs, center directors, and early-career scientists in mind.

Explore the Accelerator Programs
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The work the investigators and clinicians I partner with do matters — curing illness, developing new therapeutics, advancing what we understand about human health. That work deserves collaborative structures worthy of it.

That is why I do this.

NAVIGATING NEW HORIZONS -

Take a look at some of my current NIH and NSF funded research projects: 

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Collaborative Team During a Meeting

Creating Conditions for Scientific Lab and Project Effectiveness with The Scientific Lab Accelerator

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Creating Future-Proof Scientific Leaders with the Research Career Accelerator

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Managing People Better in Science, Engineering, and Healthcare

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Career Advancement through Mentorship Networks