Bio for Dr. Joseph Mancini, Jr.

Joseph Mancini, Jr., Ph.D., M.S.W., M.S.O.D. (Organization Development) is a professional coach and organization consultant focusing on conflict resolution, leadership development, organization change, team building and diversity. He provides organization consultation, management training, and public presentations on all the above topics.

In his work with leaders and teams, he is able to tap both his organization skills and training as an organization development consultant and his clinical skills as a private-practice therapist to improve individual and team effectiveness. His significant expertise as both a facilitator of a wide range of teams and an instructor in group dynamics has helped teams significantly improve the effectiveness of their communication and decision-making processes as well as their ability to manage internal and external conflict. He is widely sought after as a process consultant to help teams ameliorate the significant challenges they experience which impede their work tasks. Selected clients include Logicon, Department of Commerce, National Institutes of Health, Environmental Protection Agency, Public Welfare Foundation, and the Veteran’s Administration. He has been a faculty member in the George Washington University Accelerated MBA Program. He currently serves as a faculty member for University of Maryland Office of Extended and Continuing Education.

His background and skills in group dynamics combined with his doctoral training in and teaching of literature (as an Assistant Professor at the University of Maryland and several other institutions) led to his creation of RoundTable Theatre (RTT) (RoundTable Theatre for Business). This creative modality, a tool for personal, professional and corporate change, combines fun with seriousness in an improvisational format. RTT’s purpose is to help individuals and groups get out of stuck places by imagining and playing out new possibilities.

Dr. Mancini also facilitates a variety of training programs on leadership and career development, using stories, archetypal schemas, drawing, journaling, and other creative arts. He is also exploring the use of storytelling to create group cohesion, foster creativity, promote conflict resolution, influence others, transform rigid perspectives, and empower others. In all of these change programs, he makes full use of his expertise in creative thinking and also his skills as a clinician who works with transition issues every day.

He received a Master’s Degree in Organization Development from the American University/National Training Lab (where he wrote his Master’s Thesis on Change Management), a Master’s Degree in Clinical Social Work from the University of Maryland, and a Ph.D. in Literature from Harvard University. As a graduate student at Harvard, he earned Special Recognition for Teaching by the Harvard Crimson's Guide to Courses.