Intimidation happens. It can happen at the highest level.
It happened to LA and Babyface.
MJ flewed them out, gave them a studio, left them for a few days and they came up with nothing.
They eventually shytted out Slave To Them Rhythm which they freely admit isn't any good.
From L.A. Reid's book:
"Intimidated beyond belief, we sat in a couple of Los Angeles studios, trying to come up with something for Michael. But sitting there working for Michael, it was impossible to escape the idea that this was the guy who did Thriller, the biggest-selling album ever. How do you top that? How do you hope to match that kind of magnificence? It towered over us. How do you write a song he will like? At the time, Kenny(Babyface) and I were on a roll, but we couldn’t figure this out.
We were so fascinated by him, so intimidated by his talent and stature—Michael Jackson at the absolute height of his Michael Jackson–ness—that we couldn’t get it right. We spent three weeks working night and day, so we had plenty of time to get over any initial jitters. The significance of the assignment simply overwhelmed us.
I sat across the other side of the glass and watched in what was almost an out-of-body experience as Michael sang our song, top to bottom, twenty-four times in a row, and each take was better than the last. When he was done, I couldn’t tell track eight from track twenty-four—that’s how perfect his performance was. God was in the room and He looked just like Michael Jackson."