Sameer Srivastava 
Associate Professor | Harold Furst Chair in Management Philosophy and Values | Co-Director, Computational Culture Lab | Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley
Berkeley, CA, UNITED STATES
Spotlight
Areas of Expertise (6)
Culture and Cognition
Organizational Sociology
Organizational Theory
Network Analysis
Economic Sociology
Research Design and Methods
About
Sameer B. Srivastava is the Harold Furst Chair in Management Philosophy and Values at Berkeley Haas. He 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 independently and jointly relate to career outcomes. His work has been published in scholarly 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, including The New York Times, The Economist, Fortune, The Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, and Forbes. He teaches a popular MBA elective course, Power and Politics in Organizations, and co-directs the Berkeley-Stanford Computational Culture Lab.
Srivastava has also served as a partner at the global management consultancy Monitor Group (now Monitor Deloitte). He holds AB, AM, MBA, and PhD degrees from Harvard University.
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Education (4)
Harvard University: PhD, Organizational Behavior/Sociology
Harvard University: AM, Sociology
Harvard Business School: MBA
Harvard College: AB Magna Cum Laude, Economics
Links (6)
Honors & Awards (6)
Barbara and Gerson Bakar Faculty Fellowship, Haas School of Business
Recognition for faculty members “with a record of accomplishment and a very bright future”
2015
“Club 6” Member, Haas School of Business
Recognition for teaching excellence
2012-present
Best Paper Award, Wharton People Analytics Conference
2015 & 2016
Best Paper Award, Kellogg Computational Social Science Summit
2015
Schwabacher Fellowship, Haas School of Business
2014
State Farm Companies Foundation Doctoral Dissertation Award
2011
Selected External Service & Affiliations (1)
- Editorial Boards: American Sociological Review, Administrative Science Quarterly, Academy of Management Review
Positions Held (1)
At Haas since 2012
2018 - Present, Associate Professor, Haas School of Business
2012 – 2018, Assistant Professor, Haas School of Business
1993 – 1997; 1999-2007, Partner, Monitor Group, a global management consultancy
Media Appearances (9)
Diversity Doesn't Have To Come With Productivity Trade-Offs
Forbes online
2019-05-13
Research by Assoc. Prof. Sameer Srivastava, Harold Furst Chair in Management Philosophy and Values, suggests that organizations can have both a multiplicity of ideas as well as cultural alignment on organizational values. A company that checks all of the diversity boxes can see about two new additional product announcements over 10 years, which means the benefits of diversity are clear if not immediate.
Why people stay with the same company for decades
Financial Times online
2019-04-29
A new piece of research from the University of California, Berkeley and Stanford business school, has looked into what helps people fit into companies and what makes them stay.
Why mentoring matters, and how to get started
New York Times online
2018-09-26
While mentoring benefits all participants, it is especially important for young women. Work by Sameer Srivastava found that women gained more social capital from affiliation with a high-status mentor than their male counterparts did.
The high costs of staff turnover
Economist online
2018-09-22
Work by Sameer Srivastava found that new employees who are slow to learn corporate lingo are more likely to get fired, and that employees who veer away from the culture in their messages are more likely to quit for another job.
Three Ways to Build Resilience Against Gender Bias
INSEAD Knowledge online
2018-04-12
Sameer Srivastava, Harold Furst Chair in Management Philosophy and Values, and his co-authors hypothesized that a social belonging intervention might help women in tech feel less like outsiders, and therefore be better able to create a central place for themselves within the workplace. However, their research found that the intervention made no significant difference on women’s measured outcomes, either positive or negative.
Top MBAs Share Their Favorite Classes
Poets and Quants online
2017-06-24
"Moore’s classmate, Hady Barry, experienced a similar bombshell during her Power and Politics course taught by Sameer Srivastava. Before business school, Barry had avoided workplace politics, considering it a dirty practice. After completing the course, she came away with a more nuanced view of how to play the game. “The reality is that no one is immune to the power plays within an organization,” she admits. “This class taught me to approach politics in the workplace with less negativity. I now know which sources I can derive power from and how to use it to advance my career.”
The Telltale Sign a New Hire Isn’t Fitting In
The Wall Street Journal online
2017-01-10
"New hires don’t always fit in—despite companies’ best efforts to assess their cultural suitability..."
Why The Queen Bee Theory Is BS
Fast Company online
2016-06-30
The path to executive leadership can be paved with stumbling blocks for women.
The business case for women in the C-suite is strong. But the impact of being promoted into roles that don’t directly impact the bottom line, or are completely overlooked, add layers to the glass ceiling.
5 signs that a politician is a narcissistic psychopath
MarketWatch
2016-01-30
What makes a politician successful: virtues like wisdom and courage, or vices like narcissism and psychopathy?
In today’s political climate — where 75% of Americans think there is widespread corruption in the government (up from 67% in 2009), according to Gallup — many of you would likely say the latter. But research suggests otherwise
Working Papers (5)
Dampening the Echo: Receptiveness to Opposing Views, Majority-Minority Distance, and Network Homogeneity
Reschke, Brian P., Julia A. Minson, Hannah Riley Bowles, Mathijs de Vaan, and Sameer B. Srivastava
Situated Cultural Fit: Value Congruence, Perceptual Accuracy, and the Interpersonal Transmission of Culture
Lu, Richard, Jennifer A. Chatman, Amir Goldberg, and Sameer B. Srivastava
Expressly Different: Discursive Diversity and Team Performance
Lix, Katharina, Amir Goldberg, Sameer B. Srivastava, and Melissa A. Valentine
The Limits of Brief Social Psychological Interventions: Evidence from a Field Experiment
Mobasseri, Sanaz, Sameer B. Srivastava, and Laura J. Kray
Distinguishing Round from Square Pegs: Predicting Hiring Based on Pre-Hire Language Use
Stein, Sarah K., Amir Goldberg, and Sameer B. Srivastava
Selected Papers & Publications (9)
Matthew Corritore, Amir Goldberg, and Sameer B. Srivastava
Forthcoming
Srivastava, Sameer B, Amir Goldberg, V Govind Manian and Christopher Potts
2018
Doyle, Gabriel, Amir Goldberg, Sameer B. Srivastava, and Michael C. Frank
2017
Goldberg, Amir, Sameer B. Srivastava, V. Govind Manian, William Monroe, and Christopher Potts
2016
Liu, Christopher C., Sameer B. Srivastava, and Toby E. Stuart
2015
Srivastava, Sameer B. and Eliot Sherman
2015
Liu, Christopher C. and Sameer B. Srivastava
2015
Srivastava, Sameer B.
2015
Srivastava, Sameer B. and Mahzarin R. Banaji
2011
Teaching (6)
Power and Politics in Organizations
MBA Program
Strategy in Competitive Markets
Berkeley Executive Education
Boot Camp for Experienced Managers
Berkeley Executive Education
Women’s Executive Leadership Program
Berkeley Executive Education
Berkeley Executive Leadership Program
Berkeley Executive Education
Research in Macro-Organizational Behavior
PhD seminar
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