Experts

Anthony Palomba teaches leadership communication and data visualization in the MBA program as well as management communication in the MSBA program. His teaching interests are focused on how business professionals can present data results and actionable insights to key stakeholders through storytelling. In his courses, he sheds light on the way leadership communication intersects with persuasion and data-driven decision-making that lead co-workers to take actions toward reaching a shared vision or accomplishing a set of business goals.

Intellectually, Palomba is fascinated by media and entertainment companies and the way they market their products in a dynamically changing competitive landscape. As a media management scholar, Palomba's research focuses on consumer behavior, branding, and marketing behind video games, television and film. His research explores how and why audiences consume entertainment and strives to understand how consumer behavior models can be built to predict consumption patterns. Additionally, he studies how technology innovations influence competition among entertainment and media firms.

B.A., Manhattanville College; M.A., Syracuse University; Ph.D., University of Florida

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Richard S. Reynolds Professorship in Business Administration Chris Parker teaches core Operations Management courses in Darden’s MBA and ExecMBA programs. His research focuses on exploring the way in which information changes consumer, firm, and employee behavior and the impact this has on broad market outcomes. His work falls broadly into five application areas with significant overlap: (1) Information and Communication Technology for Development (ICT4D), (2) IT-Enabled Retail Models, (3) Financial Services Operations, and (4) Supply Chain Coordination, and (5) Political Engagement. In each of these areas Chris aims to use the necessary data and analyses to rigorously identify areas in which information technology is beneficial, as well as to make policy suggestions to mitigate any detrimental effects. His work has appeared in leading operations management and information systems journals including Management Science, Manufacturing & Services Operations Management, Production and Operations Management, and the Journal of Management Information Systems.

Prior to Darden, Chris was at American University and also the Smeal College of Business at Pennsylvania State University after completing his PhD in Management Science and Operations from London Business School in 2012. He was a Visiting Professor at Georgetown University's McDonough School of Business in 2016-2017. He has taught classes related to Python programming, business analytics, supply chain analytics, data visualization, statistics, and supply chain design.

Parmar is an authority on how to make good decisions — one of the toughest challenges in leading a business. He focuses on how managers make decisions and collaborate in uncertain and changing environments to create value for stakeholders. Parmar’s work helps executives better handle ambiguity in their decision-making. His recent research examines the impact of authority on moral decision-making in organizations.

In 2012 Parmar wrote the article “Moving Design from Metaphor to Management Practice” in the Journal of Organizational Design.

B.A., MBA, Ph.D., University of Virginia

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Porter’s areas of expertise include forecasting, machine learning and anomaly detection, with special focus on event prediction and pattern detection. The models he’s developed have been applied to Yelp, crime and terrorism and led to a winning performance in the National Institute of Justice’s Real-Time Crime Forecasting Challenge.

Prior to his joint appointment at the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business and School of Engineering and Applied Science, Porter taught at the University of Alabama and served as a principal research scientist at Digital Globe and project engineer at Sanford/Newell Brands.

B.S., Purdue University; M.S., Vanderbilt University; Ph.D., University of Virginia

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Powell’s current academic interests are mindful communication and leadership presence. She also has expertise in leadership and management communication, corporate reputation and diversity. In addition to her roles as professor at the UVA Darden School of Business and UVA School of Nursing, she also serves as director at the University's Compassionate Care Initiative. 

Powell has authored numerous cases and is co-author of Women in Business: The Changing Face of Leadership. She is currently working on a new book — Present: Leadership as Wise Practice. She has presented her work at the Academy of Management, the Association for Business Communication, the Management Communication Association, the National Communication Association, and the Reputation Institute’s Conference on Reputation, Image, Identity, and Competitiveness conferences.

Powell has been a consultant, facilitator, instructor and coach to a number of individuals and organizations. Her clients have included the Council for Public Relations Firms, Federal Bureau of Investigation, KPMG, Lagos (Nigeria) Public Schools, National Industries for the Blind, Premier, Providian Corporation, United Technologies, University of Virginia School of Medicine and World Bank. She has taught internationally and worked with Executive MBA students from IAE Business School (Argentina), IBMEC Sao Paulo (Brazil) and the Stockholm School of Economics (Sweden).

B.A., M.A., University of Virginia; Ph.D., Northwestern University

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Prengler’s research focuses on employees at the leading edge of two trends in organizations. First, she studies how employees in remote work arrangements create a sense of workplace out of nonwork space. Second, she studies how employees can reduce systemic discrimination in their organizations via allyship and anti-racism. In particular, she has examined the strategies used by Black law enforcement officers to reduce discrimination in police organizations and encourage diversity, equity and inclusion in both organizations and society. She has also investigated how employees can be allies to postpartum women returning to work, as well as how allies can maintain resilience through allyship shortcomings.

Prengler’s research has received numerous awards, including the 2021 AOM MOC Division's Best Student-Led Paper award, a 2021 SIOP Anti-Racism grant, a Mays Innovation Research Center grant, and her dissertation was recognized as a finalist in the 2021 INFORMS Dissertation Proposal Competition. 

B.A., Texas A&M University; M.A., Sam Houston State University; Ph.D., Texas A&M University Mays School of Business

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Raveendhran’s research focuses on the future of work: how technological advancements influence organizational actors and business practices, the integration of novel technologies into the workplace and how organizations can increase the effectiveness of their human resource management practices to address the changing nature of work.

With expertise in leadership and decision-making, Raveendhran holds a bachelor of arts in psychology from the University of Texas at Arlington and a Ph.D. in business administration from the University of Southern California, where she received multiple teaching awards. Her dissertation on behavior-tracking technologies was recognized as a finalist in the INFORMS Best Dissertation competition.

B.A., University of Texas at Arlington; Ph.D., University of Southern California

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Vivian Riefberg is a professor of practice at the University of Virginia Darden School of Business, where she holds a David C. Walentas Jefferson Scholars Foundation Professorship chair. In June 2020, she retired as a senior partner with McKinsey & Company, where she worked for over 31 years. Riefberg is now a director emeritus and senior adviser with McKinsey. She is also a board member of Signify Health.

In her time at McKinsey, Riefberg held a variety of senior leadership positions, including leader of the public sector practice for the Americas and co-leader of the U.S. health care practice. She served on McKinsey & Company's global board of directors and on the Senior Partner Committee, evaluating and developing global senior partners. Additionally, she led major strategy development, performance improvement, and organizational and operational programs across various participants in the private, public and nonprofit sectors. She worked across a range of arenas including health care, security, infrastructure and commerce.

B.A., Harvard-Radcliffe College; MBA, Harvard Business School

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An expert in diversity, authenticity and leadership development, Roberts’ research and consulting focuses on the science of maximizing human potential in diverse organizations and communities. The author of more than 50 research articles, teaching cases and practitioner-oriented content aimed at strategically activating one’s best self through strength-based development, her work has also been featured in global media outlets. She has also edited three books: Race, Work and Leadership; Positive Organizing in a Global Society; and Exploring Positive Identities and Organizations.

Prior to joining Darden, Roberts served on the faculties of Harvard Business School, Georgetown University McDonough School of Business and Antioch University’s Graduate School of Leadership and Change.

B.A., University of Virginia; M.A., Ph.D., University of Michigan

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Dwaipayan (he/him) studies socially responsible operations, focusing on the topic of diversity and inclusion within organizations and across their supply chains. In his research, Dwai attempts to blend theory with practice to analyze the opportunities for the inclusion of underserved communities in supply chains. His research takes an interdisciplinary approach to uncover new insights into the ways in which organizations design and sustain inclusive supply chains.  

Prior to joining academia, Dwaipayan worked as a project manager with The Royal Bank of Scotland. When not at work, he enjoys cooking, exploring nature and catching up on lost sleep.