Laurence Romani

My work focuses on organizations' contribution to inclusive societies, for example, with their recruitment programs. For the last few years, I have paid special attention to how the representation of persons with a migration background is done in recruitment processes. Topics that have become salient are 'merits', especially how merits are seen and evaluated in a recruitment, often slightly differently depending on the profile of the candidates, and I am investigating this with the projects MERITA as well as 'Solving the integration challenge of high-skilled migrants'.

Theoretical frameworks that I have found helpful for studying how merits are evaluated are for example, Lamont's theory of recognition (and de-stigmatisation) or Boltanski and Thévenot's Economies of Worth. I consider contributions from critical management, critical and pragmatic sociology, feminist and postcolonial organization studies to further diversity management research.

My teaching is principally at the level of Bachelors. I support students in the development of their bachelors thesis and I am now engaging in a course for a multi-actor understanding of migration and integration, with a focus on the European Union.

Finally, the outcome of my research is shared with practitioners in the form of either sessions for Executive Education or research collaborations when I engage with companies willing to critically examine their recruitment processes.