The Heller School for Social Policy and Management is pleased to announce the appointment of Joel Cutcher-Gershenfeld, an expert in institutional transformation, as a professor within the MBA program.
Cutcher-Gershenfeld, whose research focuses primarily on stakeholder alignment and integrated operating systems, will be teaching courses in strategy and operations. “My own expertise in multi-stakeholder collaboration, high performance work systems and negotiated change in organizations should help the students in leading with compassion and discipline,” he says.
In the search for a new MBA faculty member, program director Brenda Anderson says that Cutcher-Gershenfeld stood out because of his “interdisciplinary approach to both his research and pedagogy, which aligns well with the Heller School's objectives in the health and human services field, and more broadly with the work of the university.“
While Cutcher-Gershenfeld, who is the incoming editor of the Negotiation Journal, won’t be on campus full-time until the spring semester, he is already collaborating with one of his new Heller colleagues, Relational Coordination Research Collaborative Executive Director Jody Hoffer Gittell. They’ve submitted a proposal to the National Science Foundation for multi-level research that combines her focus on relational coordination at the organizational level and his focus on stakeholder alignment at the systems level.
“I am dedicated to fostering agile institutions at a time of accelerating change in technology and society,” Cutcher-Gershenfeld says. “Great societal challenges depend on agile institutions. Heller provides the ideal platform for connecting the theory, policy and practice needed for progress on these great societal challenges.”
Interim Heller Dean Marty Krauss, PhD’81, believes Cutcher-Gershenfeld will be a “major force across the school and the university. His broad intellectual interests and his commitment to high academic standards will mark a new era at the Heller School.”