Harris Sondak

Harris Sondak is David Eccles Professor of Business and Ethics and Professor of Management at the David Eccles School of Business. Dr. Sondak is Adjunct Professor of Law at the S.J. Quinney College of Law at the University of Utah.

Dr. Sondak's research investigates the psychology of allocation decisions, group process and decisions, procedural justice and ethics, and organizational aesthetics. His research has been published in Business Ethics Quarterly, Group Decision and Negotiation, the Journal of Economic Psychology, the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, the Neue Zürcher Zeitung, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Social Justice Research, and other outlets. His teaching includes courses on groups, negotiations, creating and maintaining business relationships, managing conflict in organizations, competitive strategy, managing diversity, organizational behavior, consulting to non-profits, philosophy of social science, business ethics, culture, and leadership. He has taught these subjects to executives, Ph.D. candidates, MBA students, and undergraduates from around the world. Dr. Sondak has received numerous teaching awards including the University of Utah's highest teaching honor.

Dr. Sondak served as the Director of the Daniels Fund Ethics Initiative and as the Director of the Ph.D. program at the business school at the University of Utah, as Associate Editor of Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, as Academic Advisor to Equality Utah, and was a member of the Board of Trustees of the Salt Lake Art Center in Salt Lake City. Dr. Sondak is currently an elected official of Alta, Utah.

Dr. Sondak attended St. John's College in Santa Fe, received his B.A. in philosophy from the University of Colorado, Boulder, and his M.S. and Ph.D. in organizational behavior from Northwestern University. He was a member of the faculty of the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University from 1990-1995 and has been a visiting faculty member at Duke University, the International Institute for Management Development (IMD) in Lausanne, Switzerland, the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University, the Indian School of Business in Hyderabad, India, the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, and the Graduate School of Business at Columbia University. He has been affiliated faculty with the Czech Management Center with DePaul University and the Stockholm School of Economics with the University of Michigan.

Education

• BA, Philosophy, University of Colorado
• MS, Organizational Behavior, Northwestern University
• PhD, Organizational Behavior, Northwestern University

Teaching Philosophy

I believe that core task of teaching is to introduce ideas that are meaningful and useful to students and to help them make sense of these ideas. Teaching is less about the transfer of knowledge than about helping students consider what they already know from their own experience in newly organized ways.

I have long advocated for the integration of liberal arts in the business curriculum for three reasons: First, because the world is uncertain and changing quickly, we do not know what our students will need to know over the course of their careers. We should teach analytical skills from multiple perspectives so that students can tackle future problems from alternative points of view. Our graduates must be nimble innovators and imaginative creators of value; we need to teach them how to learn throughout their lives. Second, because our goal is to educate future leaders, business programs should help students think critically about their goals and how to achieve them. Higher education in America, especially undergraduate education, has traditionally been directed toward developing citizens for a democracy. The insights students gather at business school should serve them, their organizations, and their communities. Third, even our best theories of economics, our insights about psychology, and our grasp of the sociology of business leave much unexplained and unexplored. It is expedient for business schools to embrace the help offered by other realms of knowledge.

I think that a key to teaching success is to be authentic and genuine with students – to be honest about what we know and do not know, to respect various opinions and points of view, and to be rigorous in judging the validity of an argument. I strive to be known as a teacher who demands much from students but who delivers much as well; who is approachable and caring; and who creates a classroom atmosphere that is challenging but exciting.

Teaching Interest

Management

Publications

• Canas, K. and Sondak, H. (2010) Challenging and improving the teaching of diversity Management.. International Journal of Diversity in Organizations, Communities and Nations. Published, 06/2010.
• Wade-Benzoni, K., Sondak, H., and Galinsky, A. (2010) Leaving a Legacy. Business Ethics Quarterly. Discipline based - refereed, Published, 04/2010.
• Canas, K. and Sondak, H. (2010) The opportunities and challenges of workplace diversity: Theory, cases, and exercises. 2nd Ed.. Prentice Hall. Published, 04/2010.
• Sondak, H.(2009). Gendered organizational order and negotiations research. Negotiation and Conflict Management Research. Discipline based - refereed, Published, 2009.
• Sondak, H.(2007). The opportunities and challenges of workplace diversity: Theory, cases, and exercises.. Prentice Hall. Teaching - other, Published, 2007.
• Sondak, H.(2007). How does procedural justice shape the desirability of markets?. Journal of Economic Psychology. 28, 78-92. Discipline based - refereed, Published, 2007.
• Sondak, H.(2007). Does fairness matter more to some than to others? The moderating role of workplace status on the relationship between procedural fairness perceptions and job satisfaction.. Social Justice Research. 20, 161-180. Discipline based - refereed, Published, 2007.
• Sondak, H.(2006). Gain less pain: How to negotiate burdens.. Harvard. Practice - refereed, Published, 2006.
• Sondak, H.(2005). Employing Bureaucracy: Managers, Unions, and the transformation of Work in the 20th Century. (pp. 637-639). Academy of Management Review. Discipline based - other, Published, 2005.
• Sondak, H.(2004). Uncertainty, fairness perceptions, and job satisfaction: A field study.. Social Justice Research. 17, 237-255. Discipline based - refereed, Published, 2004.
• Sondak, H.(2004). Introduction to the Emerging Scholars Special Issue of Group Decision and Negotiation. Group Decision and Negotiation. Discipline based - other, Published, 2004.
• Sondak, H.(2002). Making Sense of the Phenomenology of Groups and Group Membership. Research in Managing Groups and Teams. Published, 2002.
• Sondak, H.(1999). Relationship, input, and resource constraints: Determinants of distributive justice in individual preferences and negotiated agreements.. (pp. 489-510). Group Decision and Negotiation. Published, 1999.