About
Lauren Rivera is an award-winning sociologist and professor at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, where she teaches MBA and executive education courses in leadership and management.
Lauren’s research focuses on how the way people evaluate and define merit in elite settings shapes social inequalities by social class, gender, race, and disability status. She also studies interventions that can increase equity in schools and workplaces. She is the author of the best-selling book Pedigree: How Elite Students Get Elite Jobs (Princeton University Press, 2015) and has written for the New York Times, Fortune, Harvard Business Review, and Chicago Tribune. Her work has received various prizes from the American Sociological Association and the Academy of Management.
Lauren received her Ph.D. in sociology from Harvard University and graduated magna cum laude from Yale University with a B.A. in Sociology and Psychology. Prior to becoming a professor, she was a consultant at Monitor Group and worked for Evite.com and Leo Burnett Hispanic.