Academy of Management in Boston

What an amazing, whirlwind experience in Boston as 11,000+ scholars, practitioners, and policy makers convened in Boston to share and discuss, connect and reconnect.

Rashpal Dhensa-Khalon (Surrey) and I organized a symposium on workplace humor within and across hierarchies, which we shared with a full house (despite the 8AM Tuesday time slot). Within the symposium, I also presented my paper on humor and diversity (coauthored with Lynn Bowes-Sperry and Cecily Cooper, based on a project with Agnes Baeker with research assistance from Felix Wuethrich and Ramon Gmuer). Finally, Cecily Cooper (Miami - see below) tied the 4 papers within the symposium together with thoughtfulness and finesse; no joke–she is surely one of the best discussants in the land!

Kate Frear (SMU) and Sam Paustian-Underdahl (FSU) included my research with Tyler Okimoto (UQ), Xinxin Li (Shanghai Jiao Tong), and Brooke Gazdag (LMU) on how higher organizational identification predicts less gender discrimination at work in their symposium on gender bias. We were delighted to be included among stellar scholars such as Natalya Alonso (UBC), Ivona Hideg (Wilfrid Laurier), Shannon Cheng (Rice), and Jasmien Khattab (UVA).

Gender discrimination, of course, isn’t funny…but the photo (below) from the symposium sure is!

And finally, have you ever wondered who's conducting award-winning international management practices and research? Who's on the AOM International Theme Committee (ITC) Executive Board, responsible for selecting and honoring these practices and papers? Today's your lucky day! 👇

We were delighted to welcome a room full of scholars and practitioners at our reception last week in Boston, where we honored the following persons: 👏
1. PTC-ITC International Impactful Collaboration Award: Jeroen Veldman (Mines ParisTech), Hugh Willmott (Cass), & Filip Gregor (Responsible Companies Section)
2. Emerald Best International Dissertation Award: Maximilian (Max) Stallkamp (Virginia Tech)
3. Emerald Best International Symposium Award: Maike Andresen (Bamberg), Eleni Apospori (Athens U), & Jon Briscoe (N. Illinois)
4. Carolyn Dexter Award: Jane Lê (WHU) & Fannie Couture (University of Sydney)

Thanks again to the divisions for their nominations, to the reviewers who supported our selections, to all of the amazing practitioners and scholars who were nominated, as well as to our ITC committee members for their hard work and enthusiasm (pictured below). 💪

Women in Big Data

A great group of (mostly) computer scientists welcomed me with open arms last week for a conference on women in big data in Zurich. I met an interdisciplinary group of fellow UZH scholars Carolin Strobl (Psychology), Anne Scherer (Marketing), and Sarah Petchey (Natural Science) as well as many new faces from ETH, Europe, and beyond! I learned a lot about Artifical Intelligence (AI), algorithms, and machine learning from some of the programmers themselves; we also discussed some of the ethical and policy implications for fairness, gender equality, and more!

I left with new knowledge, ideas, contacts, and even some bling! Below is an absolutely appropriate button for the event given to me by Caitlin Kraft-Buchmann, founder and CEO of Women at the Table, who gave an inspiring, evidence-informed keynote on Affirmative Action for Algorithms.

View fullsize

I also gave a 90-second madness talk (in true “science slam” form: it all rhymed!) highlighting my interests in AI in hiring from the employee perspective, including key examples from practice such as Amazon and Unilever, touching on some work by my University of Basel colleague, Gwendolin Sajons (Business).

Here’s more information if you’re interested in the full program and/or the Twitter moment (including images from the event).

Why did the chicken cross the road? To get to our 2nd annual humor workshop!

On behalf of Dr. Jenny Hofmann, Fiorina Giuliani, Prof. Willibald Ruch, and myself, we are pleased to announce that our exciting, interdisciplinary humor workshop for early career scholars has just received funding from the Graduate Campus to take place a second time. This year, we will also offer the option of virtual attendance if we receive enough interest from applicants, in the interest of sustainability and inclusion.

Reserve the dates now and plan to be in Zurich on January 30-31, 2020. We’ll have keynotes from top international humor scholars such as Sam Yam, a top 40 b-school prof under 40 (National University of Singapore), the well-published Nale Lehmann-Willenbrock (University of Hamburg), Valentina Bambini (Institute for Advanced Study of Pavia) and Rene Proyer (Martin-Luther University Halle-Wittenberg), as well as paper development roundtables, critical topic discussions, and networking galore.

To apply, please send the following in a single, combined PDF to Dr. Jenny Hofmann by September 30, 2019 (extended to October 31, 2019):

• a 2-page (max.) CV; include your contact information, current affiliation, grants/awards, presentations, and publications,

• a short (1/4 page) motivation letter including your aims for the workshop (e.g., related to your research and career), and

• an abstract of a humor-related paper, including title, all authors and affiliations (250 words max).

All materials will be treated confidentially and only shared with the conference participants and experts. Of note, if you want to attend virtually, you still need to officially apply in the same way as the physical attendees.

More information will be posted here as we have it (e.g., a full, final list of confirmed speakers and a more detailed schedule), so stay tuned!

Leadership, Power, and Politics @IPLS

What a delight it was to catch-up with so many colleagues (e.g., my former TU Munich team members, pictured below) at the Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Leadership Symposium in Corfu, Greece. As usual, Olga Epitropaki (Durham University) and Sophia Tzagaraki did a great job organizing. I also enjoyed the keynote by one of my Swiss colleagues, Christian Zehnder (University of Lausanne).

It was invigorating to present some new ideas we’re really excited about and to experience the impressive collective brain in the room for our papers on leadership, power, and humor (with Petra Schmid, ETH Zurich, and Sam Yam, NUS) and coauthor networks (with Brooke Gazdag).

I am grateful to the SAGW, who funded part of my conference travel.

Let's get digital! ...and inclusive.

Delighted to share that Prof. Brooke Gazdag (LMU) and my new big data research on digital inequality and collaboration in science has been accepted for presentation at the inaugural the ETH-organized conference on organizing in the digital era in Switzerland. *UPDATE* Due to a time conflict that arose after acceptance, however, we unfortunately had to withdraw our paper and miss out on this amazing conference.

Our symposium on humor (with Prof. Rashpal Densa-Khalon, University of Surrey, co-organizer, and Prof. Cecily Cooper, University of Miami, discussant) that includes my paper on humor in uncertainty, as well as the symposium on gender bias in organizations (led by Prof. Samantha Paustian-Underdahl, Florida State University, and Dr. Kate Frear, Center for Creative Leadership) that includes our paper on identity and motivated reasoning (with Profs. Tyler Okimoto, University of Queensland, and Xinxin Li, Shanghai Jiao Tong University) have been accepted for presentation at the 79th annual Academy of Management Conference in Boston.

Looking forward to meeting colleagues, coauthors, and new contacts, starting, joining, and continuing discussions, and sharing science on a local and global scale.

overworked and under-familied to advance "overworked & under-familied"

It seems ironic that I was just working long hours away from my family to finish up a paper titled, “Overworked and under-familied?”

But other than the computer system failure in Dusseldorf airport on my way over, my recent 25-hour visit with my coauthor, Professor Susanne Braun, at Durham University Business School was a very efficient, productive, and fun time! Durham has several renowned leadership scholars such as Bob Lord and Olga Epitropaki, as well as several super OCB and proactivity folks–just what our paper needed. The town itself is also an idyllic English vision–complete with a castle, cathedral, and several pubs where you can accidentally stumble upon quiz night…

Now I’m looking forward to seeing some of these scholars again in Korfu for our upcoming Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Leadership Symposium (where I met many of them last year), as well as finishing up and submitting this paper. Thanks again, Susanne and Durham Business School!

She travelled 13,000KM, so I travelled 300.

Prof. Jenny Hoobler, renowned researcher of gender, leadership, and work-family intersections, recently travelled 13,000KM from Pretoria, South Africa to visit Prof. Brooke Gazdag at LMU in Munich. As a long-time admirer of Jenny’s work as well as a coauthor and friend of Brooke’s, I also made the 300KM trip to discuss ideas and experiences (over beers–it was in Munich, after all), and enjoy her presentation of her recent Journal of Management paper for the Institute for Leadership and Organization.

Per usual, it was an absolute delight to see everyone (including catching up with many members of my awesome former TUM team), and I left with more energy, enthusiasm, and insights for my research and its implications. Dankie/danke, Jenny and Brooke, and the whole LMU crew!

How to avoid casting schadenfreude

“To feel envy is human, to savor schadenfreude is devilish.”

―Arthur Schopenhauer

Schadenfreude may be a German word, but it's an emotion found in workplaces worldwide. So how can managers and organizations reduce it and its harmful effects? See this new Academy of Management Insights article about our recent Academy of Management Review paper here.

My 1st FINT in snowy St. Gallen

Earlier this month, I attended my first FINT (First International Network on Trust) conference, which was conveniently located in the nearby Swiss city of St. Gallen. The conference included a fantastic line-up of speakers from academia, banking, and non-profit organizations, including UZH’s own Prof. Roberto Weber and St. Gallen’s Prof. Antoinette Weibel (she and her team seamlessly organized/hosted this fantastic event this year). I presented a “first cut” paper on humor as a trust cue as part of our current Swiss National Science Foundation project. I also actively participated in the many social events and Swiss experiences, including an Apéro with alphorn, Swiss fondue in a cheese factory, and yodeling with Appenzellers.

Attendees were encouraging and inclusive, even for me–a diversity researcher “outsider” who is merely beginning to dabble in trust research. Indeed, my first FINT was a cool experience (both metaphorically and literally). I’m delighted to have started the year off right with such inspiring presentations, interactions, and discussions.

For more information about FINT, see here. All photos credited to the official FINT photographer, Altius Media.

1st Annual Workshop on Workplace Humor SUCCESS!

We recently welcome 20 international experts and early career scholars for our first annual winter workshop on workplace humor at the University of Zurich in Zurich, Switzerland. Cecily Cooper (Miami Business School) and Brad Bitterly (Michigan Ross) presented their recent workplace humor work and gave feedback for management scholars, while Paul McGhee (Professor Emeritus) and Tracey Platt (University of Wolverhampton) presented their thoughts on the humor habits and gelotophobia and gave feedback for psychology scholars. Thanks again to everyone for their participation and active engagement!

For a summary of the key takeaways, see here. This was created to enhance long-term learning from the event but also as an inclusion initiative for interested persons who were unable to attend.

I represented UZH business to develop and organize this interdisciplinary workshop with my super co-organizers Jennifer Hoffman and Christian Kastner (UZH Psychology). Our event was funded by a generous grant from the UZH Graduate Campus. As suggested by our title, we hope to make this a regular event. So stay tuned for details about a 2020 event!