Center’s Leadership Conference voted top 10
The Center’s Leadership Conference was listed among the top 10 most influential corporate conferences, according to corporate communications and marketing executives at Fortune 500 companies. Other conferences listed on the "Most Valued Podiums" study of 2008, which was conducted by Burson-Marsteller, a global public relations and public affairs firm, include the World Economic Forum at Davos, Switzerland and the Consumer Electronics Show. The Leadership Conference was the only university-sponsored conference to make the top 10.

Leadership Conference breaks attendance record
The 12th Annual Wharton Leadership Conference, held on June 18, 2008, in Philadelphia, was the most well-attended in the Conference's twelve-year history. The sell-out crowd heard about emerging trends in the search for leadership from an array of experts, including: Colleen C. Barrett, president and corporate secretary for Southwest Airlines; Peter Cappelli, the George W. Taylor Professor of Management and director of the Center for Human Resources at The Wharton School; Ken Chenault, chairman and chief executive officer of American Express Co.; Stew Friedman, Practice Professor of Management at The Wharton School and Director, Wharton Work/Life Integration Project; David Gergen, professor of public service and the director of the Center for Public Leadership at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University; S.A. Ibrahim, chief executive officer of Radian Group Inc.; Joe Nocera, a business columnist for the New York Times, contributor to the New York Times Magazine, and regular business commentator for NPR's Weekend Edition with Scott Simon; and William C. Weldon, chairman of the Board and chief executive officer of Johnson & Johnson.
Media coverage of the event includes two articles in Knowledge@Wharton: Judgment, Character and Ambition: David Gergen on Leadership in the 2008 Presidential Race and Johnson & Johnson CEO William Weldon: Leadership in a Decentralized Company.

Two new books by Peter Cappelli available
Talent on Demand: Managing Talent in an Age of Uncertainty, by Peter Cappelli, is now available. The book looks at the difficulties managers face in forecasting their talent needs and offers solutions from the perspective of supply chain management.
Employment Relationships: New Models of White Collar Work, edited by Peter Cappelli, is now available for pre-order. In this edited volume, contributing authors trace the latest developments in employment arrangements as employers struggle to meet the diverging demands of their product markets.

Senior Fellow publishes book on studying social dynamics
Emilio Castilla, Senior Fellow at the Center and assistant professor at MIT Sloan School of Management, recently published Dynamic Analysis in the Social Sciences. The book looks at models and methodology currently available to study social change over time. Visit the book's website for more information or to order the book.

Best restaurant in India inspires HR column
Peter Cappelli's latest column in Human Resource Executive Online was inspired by his recent whirlwind global tour, which culminated in a visit to the best restaurant in India. How this restaurant has stayed at the top of its game for 37 years offers some important human resource lessons.

Peter Cappelli comments on Chrysler's new top executive
In an article in the Detroit Free Press, Peter Cappelli commented on Bob Nardelli's effectiveness six months into his role as Chrysler LLC's top executive. Cappelli expects that Nardelli will apply many of the lessons he learned at GE to Chrysler, much in the same way he did during his tenure at Home Depot.

Peter Cappelli predicts how economic downturn will affect jobs
How will the current economic downturn affect jobs? In a recent Wall Street Journal article, Peter Cappelli predicted that "in coming months, we'll likely see companies laying off employees but also crying that they can't find people with the skills they need."