Peter Cappelli (born September 7, 1956) is a

human resources Human resources (HR) is the set of people who make up the workforce of an organization, business sector, industry, or economy. A narrower concept is human capital, the knowledge and skills which the individuals command. Similar terms include m ...

and management academic and author. He is a professor of Management and director of the Center for Human Resources at the

Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania ( ; also known as Wharton Business School, the Wharton School, Penn Wharton, and Wharton) is the business school of the University of Pennsylvania, a Private university, private Ivy League rese ...

. His research focusses on hiring and training practices, automated recruiting,

employee retention Employee retention is the ability of an organization to retain its employees and make sure the sustainability of employees. Employee retention can be represented by a simple statistic (for example, a retention rate of 80% usually indicates that an o ...

, employee performance and

talent management Talent management (TM) refers to the anticipation of required human capital for an organization and the planning to meet those needs. The field has been growing in significance and gaining interest among practitioners as well as in the scholarl ...

. His works are known for contextualizing and chronicling the evolution of employment landscape in the US.Moffitt, N. (2001)
Managing Without Commitment
''Wharton Alumni Magazine''. (Winter 2001) Retrieved 13 November 2019.

Early life and education

Peter Cappelli was born in

Upstate New York Upstate New York is a geographic region consisting of the area of New York State that lies north and northwest of the New York City metropolitan area. Although the precise boundary is debated, Upstate New York excludes New York City and Long Is ...

to a local attorney. In 1978, he received a Bachelor of Science in industrial relations from

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...

, and joined

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

as a

Fulbright Scholar The Fulbright Program, including the Fulbright–Hays Program, is one of several United States Cultural Exchange Programs with the goal of improving intercultural relations, cultural diplomacy, and intercultural competence between the people of ...

, where he earned Doctorate in Labor Economics in 1980.Management Department. (n.d.)
Peter Cappelli: Profile
'. Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. Retrieved 19 October 2019. He is a

German Marshall Fund The German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMF) is a nonpartisan American public policy think tank that seeks to promote cooperation and understanding between North America and the European Union. Founded in 1972 through a gift from the We ...

fellow, a research associate of

National Bureau of Economic Research The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) is an American private nonprofit research organization "committed to undertaking and disseminating unbiased economic research among public policymakers, business professionals, and the academic c ...

(Cambridge, Massachusetts) and a guest scholar at the

Brookings Institution The Brookings Institution, often stylized as simply Brookings, is an American research group founded in 1916. Located on Think Tank Row in Washington, D.C., the organization conducts research and education in the social sciences, primarily in ec ...

.Huffington Post. (n.d.
Peter Cappelli
Retrieved 13 November 2019.

Academic career

Cappelli joined the Wharton School in 1985 and served as the chair of its Management Department from 1995 to 1999. He has penned over 150 research titles.ResearchGate. (n.d.
Peter Cappelli
Retrieved 13 November 2019. In 2012, he released a book on Why Good People Can't Get Jobs as a follow-up to his opinion piece in

The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...

that garnered industry reviews.McGregor, Jena. (2012)
‘Why you can’t get a job (even when you’re qualified and the company is hiring)’
The Washington Post. Retrieved 20 October 2019. Cappelli led an open forum titled “Unemployed or Unemployable” at the 2013 Davos Annual Meeting of the

World Economic Forum The World Economic Forum (WEF) is an international non-governmental and lobbying organisation based in Cologny, canton of Geneva, Switzerland. It was founded on 24 January 1971 by German engineer and economist Klaus Schwab. The foundation, ...

.World Economic Forum.
Davos 2013 – Open Forum: Unemployed or Unemployable?
'.

ideo IDEO () is a design and consulting firm with offices in the U.S., England, Germany, Japan, and China. It was founded in Palo Alto, California, in 1991. The company's 700 staff uses a design thinking approach to design products, services, environ ...

Accessed 20 October 2019. His book, ''Will College Pay Off—A Guide to the Most Important Financial Decision You’ll Ever Make'', published in 2015, was discussed on CNBC

Squawk Box ''Squawk Box'' is an American business news television program that airs from 6 to 9 a.m. Eastern time on CNBC. The program is co-hosted by Joe Kernen, Becky Quick, and Andrew Ross Sorkin. Since debuting in 1995, the show has spawned a number ...

,Squawk Box. (2015)
Is college really worth the price of admission?
CNBC.

Accessed 13 November 2019.

PBS Newshour ''PBS NewsHour'' is an American evening television news program broadcast on over 350 PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virg ...

,PBS Newshour. (2015)
Why getting a college degree doesn’t always pay off
PBS.

Accessed 14 November 2019. and reviewed by the

Financial Times The ''Financial Times'' (''FT'') is a British daily newspaper printed in broadsheet and published digitally that focuses on business and economic current affairs. Based in London, England, the paper is owned by a Japanese holding company, Nik ...

,Jacobs, E. (2015)
‘Do students’ investments in their future really add up?’
Book Review of Will College Pay Off, by Peter Cappelli. Financial Times. Retrieved 29 August 2019.

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

,McGee, Suzanne. (2015)
‘Will College Payoff? The answer depends on the alternatives.’
The Guardian. Retrieved 20 October 2019. and

Quartz (publication) ''Quartz'' is an online news platform in English. It is focused on international business news. Quartz is privately held and was established in New York City in 2012. It is published in the United States with global business news and has specifi ...

.Altschuler, Glenn. (2015)
‘What you’ve been told about picking a college major is probably wrong’
Quartz. Retrieved 21 October 2019. Cappelli has been the academic director of Wharton Executive Education Advanced programs for 15 years and currently leads the TMI-Wharton Programs on Talent Management.Talent Management Institute.
Peter Cappelli: Academic Director of TMI-Wharton Programs
'. nlineRetrieved on 30 August 2019. In 2019, he designed an undergraduate course for the Wharton School on “How to be the boss” aimed at people in their 20s.Cutter, Chip. (2019)
‘Like a Boss: A College Course for First-Time Managers’
The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 20 October 2019.

Advisory and consulting

Cappelli has served on three committees of the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nati ...

in 1997, 2000 and 2007.
Peter Cappelli (Curriculum Vitae)
'. DFRetrieved 28 August 2019. During senior Bush and Clinton administrations, he was the co-director of the National Centre on the Educational Quality of Workforce with

Robert Zemsky Robert M. Zemsky (born 1941) is a Professor of Education, the Chair of the Learning Alliance for Higher Education, and the founding director of the Institute for Research on Higher Education at the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Edu ...

for the

US Department of Education The United States Department of Education is a Cabinet-level department of the United States government. It began operating on May 4, 1980, having been created after the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare was split into the Department ...

. He was a member of WEF's Global Agenda Council on Employment,World Economic Forum, Global Agenda on Employment Council. (2014).
Jobs and Skills: Tackling the Global Unemployment Crisis – Preparing for Growth
'. Davos-Klosters, Switzerland. Retrieved 29 August 2019. and a senior advisor for employment policy to the Kingdom of Bahrain between 2003 and 2005.

Awards and recognition

Cappelli was elected as a fellow of the National Academy of Human Resources (2003),The National Academy of Human Resources.
Fellows Directory , The National Academy of Human Resources
'. Retrieved 28 August 2019. was named among the 25 most important people working in the area of human capital by Vault Rankings (2001), and received the PRO award from the International Association of Corporate and Professional Recruiters for contributions to the field of human resources (2009). He was ranked fifth in HR Magazine's Top 20 most influential international thinkers in HR.HR Most Influential 2012 Top 20 International Thinkers
HR Magazine. Retrieved 14 November 2019.

Selected works

* '' The India Way: How India’s top business leaders are revolutionizing management'' (2010). * ''Why Good People Can’t Get Jobs: The Skills Gap and What Companies Can do About It'' (2012). * ''Will College Pay Off?: A Guide to the Most Important Financial Decision You'll Ever Make'' (2015). * Why we love to hate HR, Harvard Business Review (2015). * ''Fortune Makers: The Leaders Creating China’s Great Global Companies'' (2017).
Why Bosses Should Stop Thinking of ‘A Players,’ ‘B Players’ and ‘C Players’
''The Wall Street Journal'', 19 February 2017.
The Biggest Mistakes Companies Make with Hiring
''The Wall Street Journal'', 21 February 2019.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cappelli, Peter 1956 births Living people Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania faculty Economists from New York (state) American expatriates in England Cornell University alumni 21st-century American economists Alumni of the University of Oxford 20th-century American economists