The stereotype keeping East Asians from leadership jobs
New research reveals that East Asians are often perceived as less creative and are consequently under-recommended for leadership jobs.
Faculty
Jackson G. Lu is the Sloan School Career Development Associate Professor and an Associate Professor of Work and Organization Studies at the MIT Sloan School of Management. He serves as a senior editor for Organization Science, a senior editor for Management and Organization Review, and an associate editor for Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. He received his PhD from Columbia Business School in 2018 and tenure from MIT in 2023.
Jackson studies culture and globalization through two distinctive research streams. His first research stream examines the “Bamboo Ceiling” experienced by Asians despite their educational and economic achievements in the United States. His second research stream elucidates how multicultural experiences (e.g., working abroad, intercultural relationships) shape key organizational outcomes, including leadership, creativity, and ethics.
Jackson has published in top general science journals (Nature Human Behaviour, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences), management journals (Journal of Applied Psychology, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Organization Science), and psychology journals (Annual Review of Psychology, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Psychological Science). His research has been featured in over 300 media outlets (e.g., BBC, The Economist, The Financial Times, Harvard Business Review, NPR, The Boston Globe, The New York Times, The Washington Post).
He has received prestigious awards and honors, including 40 Best Business School Professors Under 40, 30 Thinkers to Watch, and career awards from the Academy of Management, the Association for Psychological Science, the Behavioral Science & Policy Association, the International Association for Conflict Management, the International Social Cognition Network, the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues, and the Society of Experimental Social Psychology. He also received the Best Senior Editor Award from Management and Organization Review in 2022 and 2023.
Featured Publication
"A Socioecological-Genetic Framework of Culture and Personality: Their Roots, Trends, and Interplay."Lu, Jackson G., Verónica Benet-Martínez, and Laura Changlan Wang. Annual Review of Psychology Vol. 74, (2023): 363-390. Download Paper.
Featured Publication
"The Bamboo Ceiling: Why East Asians but not South Asians are Underrepresented in Leadership Positions in the United States."Lu, Jackson G., Richard E. Nisbett, and Michael W. Morris. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Vol. 117, No. 9 (2020): 4590-4600. Download Paper.
Lu, Jackson G. Journal of Applied Psychology Vol. 109, No. 2 (2024): 238–256.
Vlasceanu, Madalina, Kimberly C. Doell ... Jackson G. Lu et al. Science Advances Vol. 10, No. 6 (2024): eadj5778. Download Paper.
Scharbert, Julian, Sarah Humberg ... Jackson G. Lu et al. Nature Communications Vol. 15, (2024): 1202. Download Paper. Supplementary Materials.
Lu, Jackson G. Current Opinion in Psychology Vol. 53, (2023): 101690.
New research reveals that East Asians are often perceived as less creative and are consequently under-recommended for leadership jobs.
Professor Jackson Lu has found that East Asians are stereotyped in the United States as lacking in creativity, which in turn may contribute to the “Bamboo Ceiling” in leadership attainment.
One of the underlying issues with executive support is a common lack of Asian representation in leadership positions.
Associate Professor Jackson Lu explained in his paper how the deeply ingrained perception is hindering the promotion of East Asians in leadership
New research shows that East Asian students underperform academically in business and law school because they tend to verbally participate less.
Treating Asian students as a monolith perpetuates harmful myths about the "model minority" who excels in all educational settings.