David Thomas is H. Naylor Fitzhugh Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School. His research addresses issues related to executive development, cultural diversity in organizations, leadership and organizational change. He recently served as a professor of management at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business, where he served as dean from 2011 to 2016.
During his tenure as dean, he created a culture committed to creating transformational educational experiences that prepare students to become principled and globally minded leaders poised to serve both business and society.
He joined Georgetown McDonough in 2011 following a two-decade career at Harvard Business School. While there Thomas enhanced academic and professional opportunities for the school’s undergraduate and graduate students, including a curriculum redesign and expansion of career management activities for MBA students and the addition of the Global Business Experience and an Office of Professional Development for undergraduates. He also increased the diversity of faculty and staff, launched new research initiatives and increased research funding, grew Executive Education program revenues by 400 percent, and grew the school’s endowment and increased philanthropic giving, ending the school’s capital campaign $30 million above its $100 million fundraising goal.
Partnering with the Washington, D.C., community while at Georgetown McDonough, Thomas was a member of the Federal City Council, and in 2014, the Washington Business Journal recognized him as a top Minority Business Leader.
Thomas received a bachelor’s degree, as well as masters and doctoral degrees in Organizational Behavior, from Yale University. He also holds a master’s in Organizational Psychology from Columbia University. He currently is a member of the Board of Governors for the American Red Cross, the Board of Directors of DTE Energy, and the Estoril Conferences Advisory Board. He also is an industry advisor for Brightwood Capital Advisors.
Leading for Equity tells the compelling story of the Montgomery County (Maryland) Public Schools and its transformation—in less than a decade—into a system committed to breaking the links between race and class and academic achievement. In chapters organized around six core themes, the authors lay out the essential elements of MCPS'success. They identify key lessons other districts can draw from MCPS's experience and offer a framework for applying them. A dramatic departure from "business as usual," MCPS has won nationwide attention as a compelling model for tackling the achievement and opportunity issues that confront our nation as a whole.
Laura Morgan Roberts, Anthony Mayo, Robin Ely and David Thomas
Any list of top CEOs reveals a stunning lack of diversity. Among the leaders of Fortune 500 companies, for example, just 32 are women, three are African-American, and not one is an African-American woman. What’s going on? The authors studied the careers of the roughly 2,300 alumni of African descent who have graduated from Harvard Business School since its founding, focusing on the 67 African-American women who have attained top positions in corporations or professional services firms. These women thrived, they found, because of three characteristics that are key to resilience: emotional intelligence, authenticity, and agility. The women were adept at reading interpersonal dynamics and managing their own reactions; crafting their identities; and transforming obstacles into opportunities. Beyond personal strengths, the authors say, another factor was critical: nurturing relationships with mentors who recognized the women’s talent and made it their business to support them. The insights gleaned are important not just for African-Americans and women; they’re essential for any manager who recognizes that an organization’s diversity is its strength.
This paper argues that learning in cross-race interactions is critical for work teams to realize performance benefits from racial diversity but that diversity is a liability when society's negative stereotypes about racial minorities' competence inhibit such interactions. We analyze two years of data from 496 retail bank branches to investigate racial asymmetries in the dynamics of team learning and their impact on the link between diversity and bottom-line performance. As expected, minorities' negative assessments of their team's learning environment precipitate a negative relationship between diversity and performance, irrespective of white teammates' assessments; only when both groups view the team's learning environment as supportive-implying that the team has successfully countered the negative effects of societal stereotypes on cross-race learning-is the relationship positive. We conclude that acknowledging the impact of societal asymmetries between racial groups, especially in regard to learning, can reorient research about the link between identity-group-based diversity and performance.
Winner of Administrative Science Quarterly Award for Scholarly Contribution Given annually for the most significant paper in the field of organization studies published in ASQ five years earlier
Thomas, D. A., and Karen Proudford. "Theory for Practice: Making Sense of Race Relations in Organizations." In Addressing Cultural Issues in Organizations: Beyond the Corporate Context, edited by R. Carter. Sage Publications, 1999.
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Thomas, D. A. "Mentoring and Diversity in Organizations: The Importance of Race and Gender in Work Relationships." In Diversity in the Workplace: Issues and Perspectives, edited by A. Daly. NASW Press, National Association of Social Workers, 1999.
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Thomas, D. A. "Beyond the Simple Demography-Power Hypothesis: How Blacks in Power Influence Whites to Mentors Blacks." In Mentoring Dilemmas: Developmental Relationships within Multicultural Organizations, edited by A. Murrell, F. Crosby, and R. Ely. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1999.
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Thomas, D., and M. C. Higgins. "Mentoring and the Boundaryless Career: Lessons from the Minority Experience." In Boundaryless Careers: A New Employment Principle for a New Organizational Era, edited by M. B. Arthur and D. M. Rousseau. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996.
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Thomas, D. A. "A Workshop Design for Teaching Diversity." In Teaching Diversity and the Management School Curriculum, edited by B. Ferdmon. American Association of Collegiate Schools of Business, 1994.
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Thomas, D. A. "Mentoring and Irrationality: The Role of Racial Taboos." In The Psychodynamics of Organizations, edited by L. Hirschorn and C. K. Barnett. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1993.
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Thomas, D. A., and Clayton P. Alderfer. "The Influence of Race on Career Dynamics." In Handbook of Career Theory, edited by M. Arthur, D. T. Hall, and B. Lawrence. Cambridge University Press, 1989.
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Thomas, D. A., and Clayton P. Alderfer. "The Significance of Race and Ethnicity for Understanding Organizational Behavior." In Review of Industrial and Organizational Psychology. 3 vols. Edited by C. Cooper. John Wiley & Sons, 1988.
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Studies of minority hiring have found that poor-performing firms or firms in highly competitive contexts are more likely to hire minority candidates. However, most work has examined hiring for entry and mid-level positions, not senior management. Management positions differ in terms of the amount of uncertainty in identifying candidates qualified for the job, in the intensity of external evaluations of both managerial and firm performance, and in the level of accountability for that performance. Furthermore, the influence of senior minority managers on hiring practices may differ substantially, depending on where a manager sits in the firm's hierarchy. Examining hiring practices on coaching staffs of teams in America's National Football League from 1970 to 2007, we find that better-performing teams are less likely to hire minorities to fill lower-level and mid-level coaching positions (as predicted by prior literature on labor queues), but that such teams are more likely to hire minorities into leadership positions. We also find that minority head coaches hire more minorities for subordinate coaching jobs, but that the presence of a minority offensive or defensive coordinator (with a white head coach) is a significant, negative predictor of minority hiring in junior and mid-level positions.
Workforce diversity continues to be a key focus for organizations, driven by globalization of the U.S. economy and the desire for organizations to more accurately reflect the demographic diversity of the US population. Yet, most research on diversity in organizations has focused on the outcomes associated with workforce diversity and not on the processes that can enhance diversity in organizations. We address this limitation by developing a conceptual model and propositions that highlight the attributes of effective workforce diversity initiatives and the process through which workforce diversity initiatives become effective. We focus on knowledge intensive work and argue that in this context, the nature of the work is directly tied to societal stereotypes of underrepresented minorities, making knowledge intensive firms a rich environment to examine diversity initiatives and explore the dynamics that hinder retention and promotion for underrepresented minorities in these firms. We close by discussing directions for future research on workforce diversity initiatives.
Ely, Robin J., and David A. Thomas. "Team Learning and the Radical Diversity-Performance Link." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 05-026, October 2004.
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Ely, Robin J., and David A. Thomas. "Learning from Diversity: The Effects of Learning on Performance in Racially Diverse Teams." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 04-017, October 2003.
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Higgins, Monica C., and David A. Thomas. "Constellations and Careers: Toward Understanding the Effects of Multiple Developmental Relationships." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 97-080, February 1999.
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Ely, Robin J., and David A. Thomas. "Paradigms and Pitfalls: Constructions of How Demography Affects Work." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 98-094, April 1998.
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Thomas, David A., and Karen L. Proudford. "Making Sense of Race Relations in Organizations: Theories for Practice." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 97-086, May 1997.
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Thomas, David A., and Monica C. Higgins. "Mentoring and the Boundaryless Career: Lessons from Minority Experience." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 97-020, September 1996.
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This case continues the story of the evolution of GE's business initiatives Africa. Between November 2010 and March 2011 several significant structural changes and leadership appointments were announced at GE, which reflected the company's commitment to global growth in all its regions outside the U.S., including its business in sub-Saharan Africa. In November 2010, John Rice, vice chairman of GE and president and CEO of GE Technology Infrastructure, was named vice chairman of GE and president and CEO of Global Growth and Operations (GGO). In this new role, Rice was based in Hong Kong and in charge of GE's growth in regions outside the U.S. In March 2011, Jay Ireland, a 31-year GE veteran and corporate officer, was appointed president and CEO for GE Africa, effective April 15, reporting to Rice. Additionally, three senior executives were appointed to Ireland's team: Lazarus Angbazo was promoted from president and CEO, sub-Saharan Africa, to president and CEO, GE West, East & Central Africa and Africa commercial leader; Thomas Konditi, a native of Kenya, rejoined GE as CFO for Global Growth and Operations, GE Africa; and Tamla Oates-Forney was promoted from human resources leader for sub-Saharan Africa, GE Energy, to senior human resources manager, GE Africa. While many were optimistic about GE's future in Africa, several issues still needed to be considered.
This case profiles the evolution of General Electric's African American Form (AAF), an employee affinity group, and its efforts to increase the company's involvement in Africa. The AAF formed in 1991 to help advance GE's recruitment, retention and development of black employees. By 1995, members of the AAF started asking Jack Welch whether the company was planning to develop business in Africa. After Welch invited the group to conduct due diligence, it was concluded that the timing was not right for GE to make a significant investment in Africa. Yet, when Jeffrey Immelt began attending the AAF Symposia in 2001, the question about GE's involvement in Africa resurfaced. In 2004, Immelt pledged $20 million to fund, "The Africa Project" (later renamed, "Developing Health Globally")--a GE philanthropic effort sponsored by the GE Foundation and the AAF to improve healthcare outcomes in Africa.
This case profiles the evolution of Sodexo's diversity initiative. Diversity became a key priority for Sodexo, North America in 2001 after a class-action lawsuit was filed and certified in Washington, D.C. against Sodexo Marriot Services, Inc., the food services division that Sodexo had merged with in 1998. In 2002, Dr. Rohini Anand was hired by Michel Landel, CEO of Sodexo, North America. Soon thereafter, Anand was instated as chief diversity officer for Sodexo, North America. Anand and Landel worked with several executives to develop and implement systems that were conducive to a diversity strategy. The team started to build the human resource processes that would address many of the concerns in the lawsuit: training systems, selection systems, and a career posting center. By 2010, Sodexo, North America was continuing to gain traction on its diversity strategy, and a global diversity initiative for the group was underway. In addition, the company had developed diversity priorities focused on five different dimensions of difference from a global perspective: gender, race/ethnicity, sexual orientation, disabilities, and age. However, more work still needed to be done to engage employees around the world in the company's diversity initiatives.
This case profiles the evolution of Teach Plus, a non-profit organization founded on the premise that in order for public schools to continuously improve urban student achievement, teaching must become a career that motivates and retains effective early career teachers. Teach Plus began as a pilot in fall 2007, launched by Celine Coggins, a former teacher and labor-management consultant, and incubated at the Rennie Center for Education Research and Policy in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In August 2009, Teach Plus became an independent 501 c3 with Coggins as CEO and Monique Burns Thompson, a social entrepreneur and former school district administrator as president. Since its inception, Teach Plus had demonstrated that its approach was effective in helping teachers to understand and directly influence policy. Through the T + Network, Teach Plus found evidence that reform-minded teachers existed in large numbers throughout urban school districts and that many were willing to share their perspectives with policymakers. Through the development of a public school turnaround initiative in Boston, Teach Plus showed that teacher-driven policy initiatives filled an important gap in the education reform landscape. By mid-2011, Teach Plus had grown to a network of more than 3,500 reform-minded teachers in five cities. While Teach Plus had reached significant scale in its first 18 months of operations, it also faced a significant strategic challenge. Moving forward, would Teach Plus best address its agenda as a "voice/advocacy" organization or as a "teacher turnaround" organization?
Boris Groysberg, David A. Thomas and Alison Berkley Wagonfeld
This case, set in 2008, examines how Google has worked to avoid potential negative byproducts of rapid growth such as bureaucracy, slow decision-making, lack of visibility, and organizational inconsistency. When the case protagonist, Kim Scott, started with Google in 2004, she wondered if she would still be there in several years as she liked small, entrepreneurial companies. In 2008, she was pleased that Google still had the same entrepreneurial energy that it had when she joined. She and her colleagues reflect on how Google has been able to maintain its culture as the company keeps doubling in size.
Groysberg, Boris, David A. Thomas, and Alison Berkley Wagonfeld. "Keeping Google 'Googley'." Harvard Business School Case 409-039, September 2008. (Revised July 2011.)
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It is 2010, and Gary Swart, CEO of oDesk, is contemplating the next steps for his organization. Founded in 2004 in California, oDesk operates an online marketplace which matches Employers with Contractors. oDesk provides fact-based information on Contractors, including experience, skills and certifications, to Employers who use this information as a basis for interviewing and hiring Contractors. oDesk's online marketplace also includes a payment platform and tools which allow Employers to audit and verify Contractors' work and time sheets. oDesk collects commissions, approximately 10% of gross services, on all work which goes through its platform. oDesk has enjoyed robust growth since its inception, and, to date, has focused on a very distinct market segment: small and medium sized employers, Contractors who provide computer programming services, and U.S. based employers hiring overseas Contractors. Swart believes that the time has come for oDesk to expand beyond this niche, but he is concerned about maintaining oDesk's strong reputation and market positioning and, as such, he wants to grow in a very focused manner. Should oDesk expand its customer focus to include large employers? Broaden the services its marketplace offers beyond computer programming? Or, widen its geographic reach? Each of these growth options offers opportunities and entails costs. Swart considers each of these in turn.
The "Breaking Through Action Plan" is a developmental tool based on the book, Breaking Through: The Making of Minority Executives in Corporate America by David A. Thomas and John J. Gabarro. The Action Plan was originally designed as part of a facilitated session but can also be used in conjunction with the book. The Action Plan guides individuals through an examination of the critical areas of competence, credibility, confidence, and relationships. Completing this Action Plan will allow individuals to reflect on these critical areas and help them determine appropriate and impactful steps to help further their development.
Groysberg, Boris, David A. Thomas, and David Lane. "Sonoco Products Company (TN) (A), (B), and (C), and Sonoco Products Company (A) (Abridged)." Harvard Business School Teaching Note 407-058, January 2007. (Revised June 2010.)
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Describes the steps the vice-president of human resources takes in revamping an HR function that was noncooperative and, at times, competitive and introducing the company to the notion of HR as a strategic business partner. Explores changes made to the company's compensation, performance management, and succession planning processes.
This case profiles PepsiCo's diversity journey under the leadership of former chairman and CEO Steve Reinemund who instituted diversity as one of the company's strategic imperatives. It demonstrates the ways in which Reinemund partnered with his leadership team and employees throughout the organization to make diversity a key factor in PepsiCo's culture and performance. It also reveals how, regardless of the success, PepsiCo employees were openly speculating what it would mean for the diversity strategy that Reinemund would be turning the helm of PepsiCo over to Indra Nooyi, a 50-year old Indian-born woman, who would need to find her own voice and approach to leading the company and its diversity efforts.
This case profiles President Barack Hussein Obama's rise to the presidency as an "improbable candidate." The case illustrates the ways in which he overcame criticism from those who questioned his credibility and his values, and skepticism from those who were unsure whether America was ready to elect its first African American President. It also explores how President Obama was able to gain support from the American people despite lagging behind Senator Hillary Clinton, the presumed Democratic frontrunner, throughout much of the pre-primary period.
Thomas, David A., Laura Morgan Roberts, and Stephanie Creary. "The Rise of President Barack Hussein Obama (TN)." Harvard Business School Teaching Note 409-134, June 2009.
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This exercise is designed to help students and professionals map their professional networks and identify areas of strength and weakness in their networks. "Network" refers to the set of relationships that is critical to someone's ability to learn new skills and competencies, get things done, advance in his or her career, and develop personally and professionally. The exercise takes 15 to 20 minutes to complete.
Explores how two senior Wall St. executives created a successful commercial opportunity for Lehman Brothers that focused on building relationships with minority- and women-owned financial services firms. Illustrates how Patricia Miller Zollar and Nadja Fidelia aligned the Partnership Solutions Groups' activities with Lehman Brothers' "one-firm" strategy in ways that created economic value for the firm. Delves into the challenges of developing this business in an industry that tends to view "diversity" initiatives as activities that seek only to benefit society and not as opportunities to create economic gain.
The case examines the tools a manager can use to keep her project on track and manage conflict and tension as Adobe prepares to launch Creative Suite 3, the biggest software release in the company's 25-year history. The protagonist, Yvonne Murray, is a group program manager at Adobe and responsible for coordinating the integration of her business unit's product—Device Central—in Creative Suite 3. Murray is copied on an email that warns the Device Central product team that Device Central may be pulled from the Creative Suite 3 marketing materials and from the launch entirely because it was in danger of missing a deadline. Murray wonders if and how to respond to the email that was addressed to her Device Central colleague, group product manager Carol Linburn.
The case examines the tools a manager can use to keep her project on track and manage conflict and tension as Adobe prepares to launch Creative Suite 3, the biggest software release in the company's 25-year history. The protagonist, Yvonne Murray, is a group program manager at Adobe and responsible for coordinating the integration of her business unit's product—Device Central—in Creative Suite 3. Murray is copied on an email that warns the Device Central product team that Device Central may be pulled from the Creative Suite 3 marketing materials and from the launch entirely because it was in danger of missing a deadline. Murray wonders if and how to respond to the email that was addressed to her Device Central colleague, group product manager Carol Linburn.
In the late 1970s, Stanley O'Neal joined Merrill Lynch as an investment banker. Profiles O'Neal's ascent at Merrill to CEO. O'Neal put Merrill through a comprehensive restructuring program, cutting costs and significantly reducing the work force. As CEO, O'Neal faces the challenge of changing the company's signature "Mother Merrill" culture into a performance-driven and meritocratic one, while facing resistance and criticism from inside Merrill and Wall Street. Provides data on Merrill's financial performance and investment banking ratings. Teaching Purpose: To demonstrate leadership at the executive level, highlighting the career development of a person of color. Also, to focus on changing corporate culture and CEO succession.
Describes the steps the vice-president of human resources takes in revamping an HR function that was noncooperative and, at times, competitive and introducing the company to the notion of HR as a strategic business partner. Explores changes made to the company's compensation, performance management, and succession planning processes. Teaching Purpose: To allow students to think strategically about reorganizing the human resources department to support business strategy and serve as a business partner.
Elizabeth Fisher is a graduating MBA who must reconcile her job search with Paul, her fiance's, job constraints. The case gives vivid detail of Elizabeth and Paul's process. At one point, the two must decide whether to have a commuter marriage or have Paul give up his job to relocate with Elizabeth.
Explores how IBM incorporated diversity into its business strategy, making the case that workforce diversity is critical to marketing its products and services to its customers. In the early 1990s, Ted Childs, vice-president of Workforce Diversity, proposed to CEO Lou Gerstner the creation of eight diversity task forces. Delves into the organizational and cultural impediments to starting a diversity task force initiative and how IBM overcame these obstacles to implement an effective diversity strategy. After the task forces were established, they underwent tremendous growth and became global in scope. Childs also faces the challenge of taking a U.S.-based diversity strategy and applying it to IBM's global organization. Teaching Purpose: To demonstrate how a company can implement an effective diversity strategy and integrate it into its overall business strategy.
Thomas, David A., and Ayesha Kanji. "Gary Rodkin at Pepsi-Cola North America (TN) (A), (B), and (B) (Abridged)." Harvard Business School Teaching Note 404-127, April 2004.
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After assuming the position of CEO of Pepsi-Cola North America (PCNA), Gary Rodkin faces organizational problems within PCNA and external friction between PCNA and its largest bottler, the Pepsi Bottling Group. In addition to the challenge of organizational alignment, this case also provides an opportunity to examine effective leadership, reorganization, and brand management in the context of the beverage industry.
After assuming the position of CEO of Pepsi-Cola North America (PCNA), Gary Rodkin faces organizational problems within PCNA and external friction between PCNA and its largest bottler, the Pepsi Bottling Group. In addition to the challenge of organizational alignment, this case also provides an opportunity to examine effective leadership, reorganization, and brand management in the context of the beverage industry.
After assuming the position of CEO of Pepsi-Cola North America (PCNA), Gary Rodkin faces organizational problems within PCNA and external friction between PCNA and its largest bottler, the Pepsi Bottling Group. In addition to the challenge of organizational alignment, this case also provides an opportunity to examine effective leadership, reorganization, and brand management in the context of the beverage industry.
Depicts the conflict and organizational problems that emerged in a franchise operation owned by Paul Logan, an African American, and John Heyman, a white American. Provides the opportunity to examine the ways in which race influences managerial behavior and organizational dynamics. Also raises issues of organizational performance, headquarters-franchise relations and conflict resolution.
Describes steps taken to implement and manage a successful employee mentoring program at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. A cultural change at the bank provided the context out of which the program grew. The case describes the development of the program, highlighting design principles key to the program's success and its implementation and initial results after nine months. Program manager Amy Rubinstein and executive sponsor Jack Wixted considered how to expand the successful program to include more employees while maintaining the key aspects that contributed to the program's success.
Describes Rob Waldron's actions upon assuming leadership of SCORE! Educational Centers, an after-school tutoring enterprise. Examines the issue of acquiring and growing a small, privately-owned company into a professional organization, especially regarding corporate culture. Describes the measures Waldron takes to build a culture and how he maintains the culture after the acquisition. Focuses on Waldron's actions in dealing with a growing employee morale problem. Concludes with Waldron deciding whether or not to alter the company's recruiting strategy. Includes SCORE! background material. A rewritten version of an earlier case.
Yvette Hyater-Adams, senior VP of CoreStates Bank, and CEO Terry Larsen reflect on their five-year mentor-protege relationship. They describe how building a relationship across both race and gender was challenging and ultimately highly rewarding. Their relationship develops in the context of a major culture change that Hyater-Adams and Larsen were leading the organization through. This case discusses the impact their relationship had on the organization and the change process.
Millenium Media's CEO reviews the company diversity report and considers the challenges of maintaining a diverse workforce in light of the news that three individuals, two of whom are people of color, are leaving for opportunities with a competitor.
Thomas, David A., and Emily Heaphy. "Self-Assessment and Career Development, Instructor's Course Overview (TN)." Harvard Business School Teaching Note 498-072, April 1998. (Revised June 1998.)
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The final class of the Career Development module of the Self-Assessment and Career Development course (SACD) uses the topic of mentoring and developmental relationships to encourage students to think beyond the point of finding and accepting a suitable job offer. The Karen Harper case is used to frame the discussion. The case introduces Karen when she is facing a crucial career decision that has the potential to damage her relationship with her sole mentor. The central question is, can the current developmental relationship be transformed to meet the protege's needs? After a discussion of the case, the instructor provides a brief lecture of the research on this area, including the types and functions of developmental relationships, the effects of demographic diversity on them, and strategies for initiating and forming developmental relationships.
Describes a class design for teaching students about the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). The Ideal Organization exercise is the centerpiece of the class. It demonstrates that people with different cognitive types have distinct preferences for the type of environment in which they work. Students become aware that there are diverse ways of perceiving and analyzing organizations and identify their own ideal organization. Also includes a method of integrating the MBTI with another self-assessment instrument and a description of the international use of the MBTI note.
Thomas, David A., and Emily Heaphy. "Personality Types: The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (TN)." Harvard Business School Teaching Note 498-069, March 1998.
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An effective catalyst for the job search, this note is an opportunity for students to focus on the "next steps" of their job search. Students are introduced to a model of career decision-making, which frames their discussion and sophisticates their understanding of the job search process. They then work in small groups to discuss the issues and dilemmas they each are deliberating. The small group work calls attention to the significant value that peers add to the career development and job search process.
Presents the dilemma of Don Waters, vice president of Franchise Operations at Belmont Beverages. Waters must must decide what to do about the conflict between two partners in one of Belmont's franchises.
Thomas, David A. "Star Distributors, Inc. (A) and (B) TN." Harvard Business School Teaching Note 496-004, July 1995. (Revised February 1998.)
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Craig Parks is a 1992 HBS graduate who, without much deliberation, returns to work for his former employer, Taylor Burton on Wall Street. The choice proves to be a poor fit for Craig. The case documents his decision-making process, personal history, and the dilemma he confronts once he realizes returning to Taylor Burton was the wrong decision.
Explores the life and concerns of Bob Fifer, HBS class of 1979 and CEO of Kaiser Associates. Explores the many influences on Bob's development and his subsequent career choices. It is written as a biography with extensive quotes from interviews with Bob. He describes the role of his upbringing and Jewish ethnicity in the formation of his early self-concept. Highlights the career-related choices he makes, including college at Harvard, attending business school, and entering consulting. After years of success and driven workaholic behavior, Bob experiences disillusionment and personal tragedy.
Describes the life and career of the first Japanese female investment banker at Nomura Securities, Sumiko Ito, who later became a partner at Alex Brown, a U.S. investment bank. Organized around the major life events and career transitions Ms. Ito experienced. Set in three distinct cultural milieus: Japan, England, and the United States. Eventually, Ms. Ito resigns from Alex Brown and starts her own investment company.
Studies of minority hiring have found that low-status firms are more likely to hire minority candidates. However, most work has examined hiring for entry and mid-level positions, not senior management, which differs in the level of 1) uncertainty regarding the optimal qualifications; 2) external evaluation; 3) accountability for overall performance. Given these differences, we hypothesize that legitimacy and risk concerns moderate the relationship between firm status and minority hiring. Using data from the NFL (1970-2007), we find that good teams more often hire minority head coaches, and bad teams more often hire minority assistant coaches.
Hill, Andrew, and David Thomas. "Firm Performance, Top Management and Minority Hiring: African‐American Coaches in the NFL, 1970‐2007." Paper presented at the Academy of Management Annual Meeting, Montreal, QC, August 01, 2010.
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