Njoke Thomas is an Assistant Professor in the Carroll School of Management at Boston College.

Her research highlights body’s overlooked contribution to a wide range of organizational phenomena, from career decision-making to organizational culture. Career decision-making scholarship has conventionally adopted a cognitive lens with little consideration of the body. Through research on the deliberation process of occupational entrants, she uncovers the critical role of bodily attunement in making career-defining decisions. The changing nature and context of work have several important implications for workers’ bodies. Through research on organizational wellness initiatives, she explores how workers grapple with conflicting attitudes towards their bodily limitations and needs. uses digital traces as a means of accessing unique aspects of the worker experience in traditional occupations (medicine) as well as emergent occupations spawned by social media (influencers). She hopes this work will challenge traditional assumptions about designing qualitative inquiry and promote new avenues for privileging the voice and perspectives of the research subject. Her work has been published in the Academy of Management Review.

Njoke completed her doctoral training in organizational behavior at the Weatherhead School of Management at Case Western Reserve University. Before pursuing a doctoral degree, she managed the Colorado Trust’s Equality in Health Initiative, a multi-year program aimed at promoting culturally appropriate practices in health care provision and medical education. She holds a B.A. in Human Biology from Stanford University and an M.S. in Public Health from Harvard University.

Interests

• Professional Identity Construction

• Positive Relationships at Work

• Embodied Sensemaking