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Liza Barnes, PhD

Assistant Professor

Management

Biography

Liza Y. Barnes is an Assistant Professor of Management at the LeBow College of Business. She received her PhD in Organizational Behavior from the University of Colorado’s Leeds School of Business. Her research focuses on understanding the conditions that foster or inhibit mental, physical and relational well-being at work. She primarily uses qualitative methods to explore how employees take interpersonal risks to nurture relationships and advocate for their own well-being across a variety of complex experiences such as within unequal power dyads, during employee medical leaves of absence, through mental health and women’s health challenges, and through traumatic events (past and present). Her work has been published in top management outlets such as the Academy of Management Journal, Organizational Psychology Review, and Harvard Business Review.

Areas of Expertise

  • Work Life Balance/Conflict
  • Qualitative Research Methods
  • Identity Management
  • Compassion at Work
  • Positive Relationships at Work
  • Right-Hand Partners
  • Behavioral Science/Org Behavior

Selected Works

Articles

Duffy, Margaret L., Barnes, Liza, Wirz, Christopher D., Ranganathan, Meghana, Freilich, Mara A., Freese, Lyssa M., Lalk, Ellen, and Wilcots, Julia, Factors influencing underrepresented geoscientists’ decisions to accept or decline faculty job offers in the US. Communications Earth & Environment 6 (Jan 2025):1-14.

Barnes, Liza, Lacerenza, Christina N., and Volpone, Sabrina D., Becoming a Right-Hand Partner: How Lower-Power Employees Heedfully Challenge Organizational Leaders. Academy of Management Journal 67 (Jun 2024):704-736.

Maynard, M. Travis, Conroy, Samantha, Lacerenza, Christina N., and Barnes, Liza, Teams in the wild are not extinct, but challenging to research: A guide for conducting impactful team field research with 10 recommendations and 10 best practices. Organizational Psychology Review 11 (Feb 2021):274-318.

Keplinger, Ksenia, Johnson, Stefanie K., Kirk, Jessica F., and Barnes, Liza, Women at work: Changes in sexual harassment between September 2016 and September 2018. PLOS ONE 14 (Jul 2019).

Grants

Small Research Grant (Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology) $6,250 Jan 2022.

Awards

2023 AOM MOC Outstanding Reviewer Award (Academy of Management)