ASU professor honored with Career Service Award

November 10, 2008

David Van Fleet, a management professor at Arizona State University, has received the prestigious Career Service Award from the Academy of Management (AOM).<separator></separator>AOM is the oldest and largest scholarly management association in the world and includes professionals from 100 countries around the world. The Career Service Award is the highest service honor awarded by AOM.<separator></separator>“I can think of no one who has provided greater service to the academy,” says John Humphreys, a professor of management in the College of Business and Technology at Texas A&M University – Commerce, who nominated Van Fleet for the award. “He has been a prolific scholar during his career, and he helped pioneer the study of military leadership. He is widely known for his editorial expertise, and his service to the major management professional organizations is even more exceptional.”<separator></separator>Humphreys also points to Van Fleet’s mentorship to many and attributes his own service to the discipline as part of the ASU professor’s legacy.<separator></separator>“I wasn’t at his school and there was nothing he could gain from his interactions with me. Yet, he was selfless with his time and energy to make me a better teacher, reviewer, editor and scholar, and I’m not the only one he mentored.”<separator></separator>Van Fleet, who has taught a variety of required and elective courses at ASU’s West campus since 1989, is an AOM fellow and is the current Dean of the Southern Management Association Fellows. At ASU, he has produced widely recognized research on leadership, the organization of managerial functions, and the history of management thought. He has over 240 publications and presentations, ranging from a research monograph to textbooks, and from articles in top research journals to ones in practitioner periodicals. He has also co-authored texts with colleagues from Poland, Russia and Kuwait on topics related to managerial effectiveness in cross-cultural contexts.<separator></separator>“This is a singular honor for me, because so many of the previous recipients were presidents of the academy prior to receiving the award,” says Van Fleet, who won AOM’s Showcase Study Award in 1983 from the Organizational Behavior division and was an ASU Faculty Achievement Award winner in 2001 for his efforts in research, scholarship and creative activity.<separator></separator>Van Fleet is only the eighth person to be president of two regional divisions of AOM and only the second among those eight to chair a national division of the academy. He was president of the Southwest Academy of Management and the Southern Management Association and was the chairman of AOM’s Management History division.<separator></separator>“An award such as this from those outside your own institution highlights one’s achievements and recognition within the profession,” says Van Fleet, who serves as editor of the Journal of Behavioral and Applied Management.<separator></separator>The career service award is one of four individual awards given by the academy each year – career service, distinguished educator, distinguished scholar-practitioner, scholarly contributions. According to Richard Mowday, who chaired the 2008 AOM awards committee, Van Fleet’s selection was an easy one.<separator></separator>“The award is prestigious,” says Mowday, professor emeritus in the Lindquist College of Business at the University of Oregon. “I received nominations for each of the four division awards and managed the process through which a committee of five distinguished academics selected the winners. In David’s case, it was an easy choice.<separator></separator>“He has a distinguished record of service contributions to the profession and has been instrumental in helping shape the field of study focusing on military leadership.”

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