Karen Jansen

Bio

Karen Jansen is professor and department head in management, innovation and entrepreneurship at Poole College of Business at NC State University. Previous appointments include Henley Business School, Australian National University, University of Virginia and Penn State University. Her research broadly examines dynamic processes that evolve over time, including how person-environment fit evolves into misfit, and how to sustain engagement and energy over the course of strategic and transformational change. Karen is also interested in temporal dynamics, the impact of events, and social change. In addition to an active research agenda, professor Jansen serves on the editorial boards of Journal of Management and the Academy of Management Review, where she is currently guest editing a special issue on time in organizations.

She has helped military, manufacturing, financial, and professional service organizations to successfully navigate strategic change and transformation. She has also developed several practical tools, including Momentum Mapping to help organizations manage change-related energy during transformational change, and FitID to identify individual motives for fitting in at work, improving recruitment, and avoiding costly turnover. In custom executive education offerings, she has designed and delivered a variety of targeted and custom programs, including a 9-month program on transformational change leadership and a 6-week leading excellence program in the National Health System.

Karen obtained her bachelor’s degree in mathematics and computer science, holds a master’s degree in education, and a Ph.D. in organizational change and strategic human resource management from Texas A&M. Prior to becoming an academic, she had a nine-year career at IBM as a systems engineer.