Speakers Bios & Abstracts

Herminia Ibarra is the Cora Chaired Professor of Leadership and Learning and Professor of Organisational Behaviour at INSEAD and chairs the Visiting Committee of the Harvard Business School. Prior to joining INSEAD she served on the Harvard Business School faculty for thirteen years. She ALSO HAS BEEN Vice-Chair of the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on Women's Empowerment . Thinkers50 ranked Ibarra #9 among the most influential business gurus in the world.

Professor Ibarra is an expert on professional and leadership development. Her book Working Identity: Unconventional Strategies for Reinventing Your Career

(Harvard Business School Press, 2003) documents how people reinvent

themselves at work. Her numerous articles are published in leading

journals including the Harvard Business Review, Administrative Science Quarterly , Academy of Management Review, Academy of Management Journal, and Organization Science. Her research has been profiled in a wide range of media including The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Financial Times and The Economist.

She teaches in a variety of INSEAD programs and consults

internationally on talent management, leadership development, and

women’s careers. A native of Cuba, Ibarra received her M.A. and Ph.D.

from Yale University, where she was a National Science Fellow.

Scaling up leadership

Early theories about personal traits of successful leaders gave way to situational leadership and behavioral studies of what managers really do in situ. Over the past decade, the pendulum swung back to individual qualities, with leaders encouraged to find their authentic selves amidst antiquated structures and unyielding performance pressures. We’re now on the verge of a fourth transformation in the theory and practice of management, in which leaders are challenged to both reinvent and scale their leadership.