Piers Steel

Piers Steel is an associate professor of Human Resources and Organizational Dynamics. He has been teaching at the Haskayne School of Business since 2002. He received his BA from University of Toronto, his Masters from University of Guelph, and his PhD from University of Minnesota.  There he studied under both the business (Human Resources and Industrial Relations) and psychological (Industrial/Organizational) schools. Prior to joining Haskayne, Piers taught at the University of Minnesota for three years.

Piers teaches Human Resource courses for undergraduate students and MBAs as well as motivation and statistical courses for graduate students. Piers’ particular areas of research interest include personnel selection, culture, and motivation, particularly procrastination.

Piers is continuing to research procrastination and culture, while his previous research focused on personnel selection. Piers’ work has been published in the premier journals in the social sciences (e.g., Academy of Management Review, Psychological Bulletin) and business specifically (e.g., Journal of Applied Psychology, Personnel Psychology). He has received several teaching awards, including the Dean's Award for "Outstanding Leadership in Teaching and Learning" and the Academy of Management "Best Paper in Management Education." Similarly, he has coached the University of Calgary's team to be national champions of the Excalibur HR case study competition.

Piers has received international recognition for his procrastination research, with widespread media coverage ranging from the New York Times, USA Today, the Globe & Mail, the National Post, and Scientific American. Attention has also focused on synthetic validity work, a project to create a universal, automatic, instantaneous selection system. Of note, his studies are available on-line at http://www.procrastinus.com/.

Research and Publications
Steel, P. & Kammeyer-Mueller, J. (2002). Comparing meta-analytic moderator search techniques under realistic conditions. Journal of Applied Psychology, 87(1), 96-111.

Peloza, J., & Steel, P. (2005). The price elasticities of charitable contributions: A meta-analysis. Journal of Public Policy & Marketing, 24(2), 260-272.

Steel, P. & König, C. J. (2006). Integrating theories of motivation. Academy of Management Review, 31, 889-913.

Steel, P., Huffcutt, A. I., & Kammeyer-Mueller, J. (2006). From the work one knows the worker: A systematic review of the challenges, solutions, and steps towards creating synthetic validity. International Journal of Selection and Assessment, 14, 16-36.

Steel, P. (2007). The nature of procrastination. Psychological Bulletin, 133(1), 65-94.

Steel, P., Schmidt, J., & Shultz, J. (2008). Refining the relationship between personality and subjective well-being. Psychological Bulletin, 134(1), 138-161.

• Courses