About Me


Welcome to my blog about work. I am a university professor who researches and teaches about diverse aspects of work, employment, and related institutions (e.g., labor unions) from a multidisciplinary perspective drawing on scholarship in industrial relations, economics, law, sociology, psychology, ethics, theology, and other disciplines. I've also developed a fully-online MOOC on "Preparing to Manage Human Resources" open to anyone who is interested at any time. I've also served as Director of Graduate Studies for Minnesota's graduate program in Human Resources and Industrial Relations, one of the preeminent HR graduate programs in the United States.

I've been at the University of Minnesota's Carlson School of Management since 1991 where I am now the Industrial Relations Land Grant Chair and Director of the Center for Human Resources and Labor Studies. I'm a graduate of Colgate University and received M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from Princeton University.

My books include:


  • Employment with a Human Face: Balancing Efficiency, Equity, and Voice (Cornell University Press, 2004).
  • Invisible Hands, Invisible Objectives: Bringing Workplace Law and Public Policy Into Focus (with Stephen Befort, Stanford University Press, 2009).
  • Labor Relations: Striking a Balance (McGraw-Hill/Irwin, 2018).
  • The Thought of Work (Cornell University Press, 2011). 

    • I'm also the author of numerous journal articles, and the recipient of several teaching awards.

    For more on my research and books, visit my website. If you are really curious, you can read my personal work narrative.

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