Theresa

M.

Welbourne

, Ph.D.

Executive Director of the Alabama Entrepreneurship Institute

Professor of Management, Will and Maggie Brooke Endowed Professorship in Entrepreneurship

Education

Ph.D., University of Colorado at Boulder
BSBA, University of Colorado at Boulder

Biography

Dr. Theresa M. Welbourne’s expertise is in the areas of entrepreneurship, human capital management and strategic leadership in high growth, entrepreneurial and high change organizations. She is the founder, president, and CEO of eePulse, Inc., a human capital technology and consulting firm. Dr. Welbourne’s research and work have been featured in popular publications such as Inc. Magazine, Wall Street Journal, The Financial Times, Business Week, New York Times, and Entrepreneur Magazine, and she is well published in numerous academic journals and books as well as business books. Dr. Welbourne also runs two large-scale research studies, one focused on high-growth companies and initial public offerings (IPOs), and another that is focused on employee resource groups (ERGs), how they drive innovation and firm-level growth, and their evolution to Strategic Resource Groups. As part of this work, she also studies employee energy and how it can be managed to improve wellness, productivity, growth, and innovation. Theresa was awarded the 2012 Academy of Management Distinguished Executive Award (for contributions in research, teaching and practice), in 2017 she was named a Society of Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP) Fellow, and in 2022 she made the Business Alabama list of the top 22 Women in Tech. Dr. Welbourne also holds an appointment as an affiliated senior research scientist with the Center for Effective Organizations, Marshall School of Business, University of Southern California. Theresa consults with organizations that are interested in optimizing human capital to drive innovation and growth. She uses a data-driven approach to help leaders learn how to respond rapidly to changing circumstances, avoiding dips in productivity and performance. She worked in the technology industry in Colorado for ten years before receiving her PhD at the University of Colorado, and she held faculty appointments at Cornell University, the University of Michigan, University of Nebraska, and the University of Southern California before moving to Alabama.

Selected Publications

Song, X. & Welbourne, T.M. (2024). Entrepreneurial growth as strategy: An integrative review and agenda for future research. Journal of General Management. https://doi.org/10.1177/03063070241289776

Welbourne, T.M. (2024). Leader energy driving personal and firm-level wellness: Lessons from 20 years of the leadership pulse. Research in Occupational Stress and Well Being, Volume 21, 199-136. Emerald Publishing Limited.

Welbourne, T. M., Paterson, T. A., (2017). Advancing a Richer View of IDentity at Work: The Role-Based Identity Scale. Personnel Psychology, 70(2), 315-356.

Welbourne, T. M. (2014). Two numbers needed for growth and innovation: Working and optimal employee energy. Organizational Dynamics, 43(3), 180-188.