Dolly Chugh (she/her, hear my name) is a social psychologist and management professor at the New York University Stern School of Business where she teaches MBA courses in leadership and management. Because of Dolly’s teaching skills, she was one of six professors chosen from thousands at New York University to receive the Distinguished Teaching Award in 2020 and one of five to receive the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Faculty Award in 2013.

Picture of Dolly, Credit Jeannie Ashton

credit: jeannie ashton

Dolly’s research focuses on “bounded ethicality,” which she describes as the “psychology of good people.” Her work has been published in the leading psychology, economics, and management journals, and cited by many books and authors. She has been named an SPSP Fellow, received the Academy of Management Journal Best Paper award, been named one of the top 100 Most Influential People in Business Ethics by Ethisphere Magazine, and received many other research honors.

Dolly is best known for her two books The Person You Mean to Be:  How Good People Fight Bias (HarperCollins, 2018) and A More Just Future:  Psychological Tools for Reckoning with our Past and Driving Social Change (Simon & Schuster, 2022).  

Her work has received rave praise from Adam Grant, Angela Lee Duckworth, Liz Wiseman, Billie Jean King, Kenji Yoshino, and many others.  It has been covered on the TODAY Show, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, the Atlantic, the 10% Happier Podcast, the goop Podcast, NPR, Dr. Phil, and other media outlets.  

Dolly’s TED Talk was named one of the 25 Most Popular TED Talks of 2018 and currently has almost 5 million views.  

CREDIT: cheryl cronin

Prior to becoming an academic, Dolly worked at Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch, Sibson and Company, Scholastic, and Time Inc. Dolly attended Cornell University where she majored in psychology and economics for her undergraduate degree and Harvard University for her MBA and PhD.