Agenda

Nishi Gautam, a doctoral candidate at the College of Management, University of Massachusetts, Boston. She is a social movement and activism scholar studying employee activism in the tech sector using multiple methodological approaches to analyze and understand this phenomenon. She examines both macro and micro structures and processes that constrain and enhance activism and its outcomes, using both qualitative and quantitative methods. She aims to highlight how activists, by leveraging various opportunity structures and processes—such as interactions with firms, tactics, and the use of social media framing—drive change within organizations and broader society.

Katrin Heucher is an Assistant Professor of Change Management and Sustainability at the Department of Innovation Management and Strategy, University of Groningen, Netherlands. Her research focuses on the intersection of sustainability management and organization studies, with a particular emphasis on insider social change agents. Employing qualitative methods, especially ethnography, she explores how organizations and individuals navigate sustainability efforts and internal paradoxical tensions. Her work has been published in leading management journals such as the Academy of Management Annals, Journal of International Management, Journal of Management Inquiry, and Strategic Organization. Katrin's research contributions have been recognized with several awards, including the Academy of Management ONE Division Best Dissertation Award and a recent Impact Acceleration Grant for her work on insider social change agents.

Katrin also holds a leadership position in the strategic initiative focusing on driving sustainability research, education, and societal impact within the University of Groningen. Katrin teaches a range of courses aimed at equipping students with the skills to drive social change. In December 2024, she will launch a new executive MBA course, “Enacting Change in Ecosystems.”

She earned her PhD from Loughborough University, UK, and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the Erb Institute, University of Michigan, USA. Before her PhD, Katrin worked in the chemical industry in the areas of international marketing and business strategy at BASF and LANXESS, gaining international experience in Europe and China. She holds a BA in Regional Studies China and Business Administration from the University of Cologne, Germany, and an MSc in International Management for China from SOAS, University of London, UK.

Raquel Kessinger is an Assistant Professor at Boston College, Carroll School of Management. Kessinger’s research uses qualitative methods to explore the changing nature of work through the lenses of employee voice, social movements and organizations, and relationships at work. She explores how factors such as a polarized political climate, pressure for companies to grow, and new technologies are reshaping how employees interact with their managers. Specifically, she considers the social, political, and moral issues prompting employee activists to press their firms to change, how employee activists mobilize for collective action or engage in noisy exits, how they interpret managerial responses to activism, and how they build lasting capacity across movements and organizations. She also examines how new performance management technologies are reshaping the role of middle managers in organizations.

Kessinger holds a Ph.D. in Management and an MS in Management Research from MIT. Prior to MIT, she attended the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and earned an MBA with concentrations in Organizational Effectiveness, Operations, and Multinational Management. During her two summers at Wharton, she worked at Spanx on the People Team and as a summer consultant at the Boston Consulting Group (BCG). Before business school, she worked at the Central Intelligence Agency for more than five years as a terrorism and security analyst and at Gerson Lehrman Group as a research associate for hedge fund and private equity clients. She attended Vanderbilt University for her undergraduate studies, majoring in Political Science and Spanish, and minoring in Corporate Strategy.

Nancy McGaw is Senior Advisor at the Aspen Institute Business & Society Program (Aspen BSP). In 2009 she founded the First Movers Fellowship Program, an innovation lab and leadership development program for exceptional business professionals (social intrapreneurs) who have demonstrated an ability and passion for imagining new products, services, and management practices that achieve profitable business growth and lasting, positive social impacts. Her new book, Making Work Matter: How to Create Positive Change in your Company and Meaning in Your Career, captures some of their inspiring stories and offers strategies to help others develop the mindsets and skills needed to become successful corporate intrapreneurs.

Sara Soderstrom is an Associate Professor in Organizational Studies & Program in the Environment and Arthur Thurnau Professor at University of Michigan (UM). She is serving as Director of Program in the Environment and Faculty Director of the Undergraduate Fellows Program at the Erb Institute. Sara completed her PhD at the Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University and a postdoctoral fellowship at the Erb Institute at UM. Prior to her graduate work at Kellogg, Sara worked as a consultant at McKinsey & Company and led a business transformation team at Auto Club Group. She holds MSE degrees in Chemical & Environmental Engineering and a BSE degree in Chemical Engineering from UM. In her research, Sara aims to contribute an organizational perspective on how society develops solutions to critical global sustainability challenges. Sara studies how individuals within organizations mobilize others, develop coalitions, and access key decision makers when they are trying to implement sustainability initiatives. She has published in numerous management journals including Administrative Science Quarterly, Academy of Management Journal, Academy of Management Annals, Organization & Environment, Journal of Business Ethics, and Organization Studies. Sara teaches multiple courses at the University of Michigan that focus on the intersection of organizations and sustainability. She has received numerous awards, including the 2016 Individual Award for Outstanding Contributions to Undergraduate Education, the Class of 1923 Memorial Teaching Award for Outstanding Teaching of Undergraduates, and the Harold R. Johnson Diversity Service Award.