Tojo Thatchenkery

Tojo Thatchenkery (Ph.D. Weatherhead School of Management, Case Western Reserve University) is an internationally known speaker, consultant, and educator. He is professor and director of the Organization Development and Knowledge Management program at George Mason University, Arlington, Virginia. He is also a member of the NTL Institute of Applied Behavioral Science and the Taos Institute. Thatchenkery is the author of over a dozen books and hundreds of articles. One of them, Appreciative Intelligence: Seeing the Mighty Oak in the Acorn was a Harvard Business Review recommend book. In it he states that the secret to success lies in something that everyone has the ability to do: reframe reality to reveal the hidden potential often present in the most challenging situations. Appreciative Intelligence also helps others to accept the present moment as full of promises, a key ingredient to mindfulness. In another book, Making the Invisible Visible Thatchenkery introduced the concept of quiet leadership as a key driver for innovation in organizations. The quiet leader mindfully observes what’s around her and builds on the strengths of the team. He has also written books on appreciative inquiry, knowledge management, sustainable development, social capital, postmodernism, and information technology and economic development.

Thatchenkery has extensive consulting experience in change management, leadership development, organization design and strategy, diversity, and knowledge management. Past and current clients include Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, IBM, Fannie Mae, Booz Allen, Deloitte, PNC Bank, Lucent Technologies, General Mills, 3M, British Petroleum, the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, United States Department of Agriculture, United States Environmental Protection Agency, Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, USPS OIG, U.S Department of Treasury, Akbank (Turkey), and the Tata Consulting Services (India). His research and consulting also focuses on Asian Americans and organizational mobility. Starting with his special issue of the Journal of Applied Behavioral Sciences on this topic, he is one of the first researchers to analyze the human and social capital dynamics unique to Asian Americans in federal agencies and corporate America. Thatchenkery regularly consults and offers workshops to public and private sector organizations on this topic.

Thatchenkery has over twenty-five years of experience in teaching at various Public Policy, MBA, Organization Development, and executive development programs in the United States, Canada, South America, Europe, Australia, and Asia. He is on the editorial board of the Journal of Applied Behavioral Sciences and the Journal of Organizational Change Management and is the past Program Chair of the Research Methods Division of the Academy of Management (http://aom.org/). He also founded the Organizational Learning Laboratory at the George W. Johnson Learning Center and served as its director from 1995 to 2000. During this time the facility was featured as one of the leading laboratories for organizational learning and knowledge management by the Academy of Management and the Project Management Journal and served clients such as Fannie Mae.

For more information about Thatchenkery, please visit www.appreciativeintelligence.com