Our Team

Jody Hoffer Gittell is Professor and PhD Program Director at Brandeis University's Heller School, and Program Director of the Academy of Management’s Organization Development and Change Division. Gittell teaches Strategic Human Resource Management, Research Methods, and Organizational and Institutional Theory.  She is the Founder and Director of the Relational Coordination Collaborative and Chief Executive Officer of Relational Coordination Analytics. She is an expert in relational strategies for achieving organizational performance, organizational change and human well-being.  She has published dozens of scientific articles and six books including The Southwest Airlines Way: Using the Power of Relationships to Achieve High Performance, High Performance Healthcare: Using the Power of Relationships to Achieve Quality, Efficiency and Resilience, and Transforming Relationships for High Performance: The Power of Relational Coordination.  She currently has a seventh book in process called Healthcare Management and Human Well-Being in a Turbulent Era.  

Dr. Gittell founded relational coordination theory, which predicts that highly interdependent work is most effectively coordinated through relationships of shared goals, shared knowledge, and mutual respect, supported by frequent, timely, accurate, problem-solving communication. The theory shows how relational coordination drives a wide range of desired performance outcomes and how organizations shape it, for better or worse.  Dr. Gittell speaks frequently to audiences about the theory and practice of relational coordination. She serves as Vice Chair of the Board for Greater Seacoast Community Health, and on the Executive Committee for NAACP Seacoast. She earned her BA from Reed College, her MA from The New School, and her PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Fernanda Artimos de Oliveira is a doctoral student in Children, Youth, and Families concentration at The Heller School at Brandeis University. She is a lawyer licensed to practice Law in Brazil since 2007 and holds a Master's Degree in Health Sciences from the Federal Fluminense University (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) where her research aimed to address the impact of public health programs and social policies on children with severe disabilities (Congenital ZIKA Syndrome) affected by the Zika virus epidemic, which peaked in Brazil between 2015 and 2017. Her research interests include examining the effects of public policies on vulnerable, at-risk populations (such as people with disabilities, those dealing with chronic diseases, or those requiring long-term care) and how the healthcare delivery system and the social safety net can ameliorate these inequities.

Adwoa Adobea Owusu is a communications and media professional whose work bridges the fields of racial justice, technology governance, and investigative journalism across Africa and the United States. At the Heller School, she serves as a Student Program Administrator for the Racial Justice and Tech Policy program. In this role, she oversees digital communications, stakeholder outreach, and programming that examines how emerging technologies impact historically marginalized communities. She also serves as a Graduate Student Ambassador for the Office of Graduate Affairs.

Before joining Brandeis, Adwoa spent nearly a decade working in Ghana’s media and development sectors. As an investigative journalist and fact-checker at the Media Foundation for West Africa, she helped expose procurement fraud, corruption in school admissions, and regulatory failures in the health sector. Her reporting contributed to national policy reforms and won several accolades, including the West Africa Best Fact-checking Report (2024), the Africa Investigative Journalism Conference Award (2024), and a Merck Foundation prize for coverage of infertility stigma (2019). She also trained journalists across West Africa and mentored early-career journalists.

Adwoa’s background includes roles at TV3 Ghana and the German Development Corporation (GIZ).