Sameer B. SRIVASTAVA
Keynote 4
Harnessing AI for Organizational Theory Research, While Avoiding its Pitfalls
(July 6, 1:00 PM - 2:00 PM)
Biography
Sameer B. Srivastava is the Ewald T. Grether Professor of Business Administration and Public Policy at UC Berkeley's Haas School of Business and is also affiliated with UC Berkeley Sociology. His research unpacks the complex interrelationships among the culture of social groups, the cognition of individuals within these groups, and the connections that people forge within and across groups. Much of his work is set in organizational contexts, where he uses computational methods to examine how culture, cognition, and networks relate to career outcomes. His work has been published in journals such as American Journal of Sociology, American Sociological Review, Administrative Science Quarterly, Management Science, and Organization Science. It has been covered in media outlets such as The New York Times, Fortune, The Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, and Forbes. Sameer co-directs the Berkeley Culture Initiative and the Berkeley-Stanford Computational Culture Lab. In a prior career, Sameer was a partner at a global management consultancy (Monitor Group; now Monitor Deloitte). He holds AB, AM, MBA, and PhD degrees from Harvard University.
Abstract
This talk will explore the intersections of AI, organizational theory, and managerial practice. I will highlight emerging methods for measuring different facets of culture, cognition, and social networks in organizations and illustrate how they can shed new light on the drivers of individual, group, and organizational performance. I will also discuss potential pitfalls of AI in organizational research and some admittedly incomplete and evolving thinking on how to avoid them. Applications of these methods to such topics as post-merger cultural integration, cognitive diversity in groups, organizational identification, and innovation will be discussed.