Barry Z. Posner

Barry Z. Posner is the Michael J. Accolti, S. J. Professor of Leadership at Santa Clara University and chair of the Management and Entrepreneurship

Department in the Leavey School of Business, where he previously served fo twelve years as dean, six years as associate dean for graduate programs,

and six years as associate dean for executive education. Barry has received the Association for Talent Development’s highest award for Distinguished Contribution to Workplace Learning and Performance. He has been recognized as one of the top fifty leadership coaches in America, ranked among the most influential HR thinkers in the world by HR magazine, and Inc. magazine included him among the world’s top seventy-five leadership and management experts.

Barry is the coauthor (with Jim Kouzes) of the award-winning and best-selling leadership book The Leadership Challenge. Now in its seventh edition,

with more than three million copies in print, the book continues to be a groundbreaking research study, combining keen insights with practical applications, and has been translated into twenty-two foreign languages. It is listed among The 100 Best Business Books of All Time, receiving book-of-the-year honors by the American Council of Health Care Executives and Fast Company, and the Critics’ Choice Award from the nation’s book

review editors. Kouzes and Posner’s Leadership Practices Inventory (LPI) has been called “the most reliable, up-to-date leadership instrument available

today.” The 360-degree online version has been completed by more than four million people.

Barry has coauthored other award-winning, inspiring, and practical books on leadership: Everyday People, Extraordinary Leadership: How to Make a Difference Regardless of Your Title, Role, or Authority; Leading in Law: Leadership Development for Law Students; Leadership in Higher Education: Practices that Make a Difference; Stop Selling & Start Leading; Learning Leadership: The Five Fundamentals for Becoming an Exemplary Leader; Turning Adversity into Opportunity; Finding the Courage to Lead; Great Leadership Creates Great Workplaces; Credibility: How Leaders Gain and Lose It, Why People Demand It; The Truth about Leadership: The No-Fads, Heart-of-the-Matter Facts You Need to Know; Encouraging the Heart: A Leader’s Guide to Rewarding and Recognizing Others; A Leader’s Legacy; Extraordinary Leadership in Australia and New Zealand; Making Extraordinary Things Happen in Asia; and The Student Leadership Challenge.

Barry is an internationally renowned scholar who has published more than one hundred research and practitioner-oriented articles in such publications as the Harvard Business Review, Academy of Management Journal, Journal of Applied Psychology, Human Relations, Personnel Psychology, Journal of Selling, and IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management. He has served on a number of public and nonprofit boards, such as the American Institute of Architects, Berkeley Food Network, Center for Excellence in Nonprofits, Global Women’s Leadership Network, Sigma Phi Epsilon Fraternity, SVCreates, and Uplift Family Services.

He received an undergraduate degree in political science from the University of California–Santa Barbara, a master’s degree from The Ohio State University in public administration, and his PhD in organizational behavior and administrative theory from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. At Santa Clara, he has received several outstanding teaching and leadership honors, including the President’s Distinguished Faculty Award and the School’s Extraordinary Faculty Award. Barry has been a visiting professor at the University of Western Australia, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Sabanci University (Istanbul), the University of Auckland (New Zealand), and Seattle University. He has made presentations and conducted leadership development programs for corporations across the globe and has been involved with leadership development efforts at more than seventy-five college campuses.