Virginia J. Vanderslice, PhD, has been researching and working with employee-owned companies for her entire professional career. She was co-founder and, for more than 20 years, the president of Praxis Consulting Group, an organizational development firm focused on supporting and contributing to the success of employee-owned and other mission-driven organizations. Ginny has taught undergraduate and graduate level courses at Cornell University and Swarthmore College, and she serves as a Faculty Mentor in the Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing at Rutgers University School of Management and Labor Relations. She has been teaching courses on organizational change and development, enterprise culture, and leadership at the University of Pennsylvania since 1991.
A major focus of Ginny’s professional practice during the last twenty years has been designing and delivering leadership development programs that support the creation and maintenance of high-performing ownership cultures. To support the success and long-term sustainability of employee-owned companies, her work has also included coaching CEOs, assisting boards in creating and implementing succession plans, and working with company leaders to develop succession systems that cover all key organizational roles. Ginny was recognized with the Life Service Award by the Employee Ownership Association in 2017. She has published widely in both trade and peer-reviewed journals and books. See, for example, Leadership Development and Succession (National Center for Employee Ownership, 2nd edition, 2022).
Ginny is the designer and lead faculty member of the first leadership development program designed specifically for current and incoming CEOs and Presidents of employee-owned companies. Ginny directs the employee ownership certificate program at the Center for Social Impact Strategy in the School of Social Policy and Practice at the University of Pennsylvania.
Ginny holds BS and MS degrees from Cornell University and a PhD in the social psychology of groups and organizations from the State University of New York at Buffalo.
