Concept
David Anthony Thomas (born September 26, 1956) is an American psychologist, expert on organizational behavior, and academic administrator who currently serves as the 12th president of Morehouse College, a historically Black men's college in Atlanta. From 2017 to 2018, he was the H. Naylor Fitzhugh Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School. Thomas served at the Georgetown University McDonough School of Business as its Dean from 2011 to 2016 and as the William R. Berkley Chair and Professor of Management from 2016 to 2017. Thomas was earlier a professor of business administration at Harvard University, from 1990 to 2011, where he rose to direct the school's Organizational Behavior Unit as the Fitzhugh chair from 2006 to 2011. He was a senior associate dean and director of faculty recruitment, there, from 2005 to 2008. Before joining the faculty at Harvard in 1990, Thomas was an assistant professor of management at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania from 1986 to 1990. Thomas was born and raised in Kansas City, Missouri, where he attended Paseo Academy. In high school, Thomas studied abroad in France. He earned his Bachelor of Arts in administrative sciences from Yale University, graduating in 1978. Thomas then earned a master's degree in organizational psychology from Columbia University in 1981 and returned to Yale to earn his Master of Philosophy in 1984 and his Doctor of Philosophy in 1986. When he was applying for undergraduate studies, he wanted to go to Morehouse College and was accepted, but instead chose Yale, where he was able to receive financial aid. After earning his doctorate in 1986, Thomas was hired as an assistant professor of management at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. Upon his appointment, he was awarded the title of Atlantic Richfield Foundation Term Assistant Professor of Human Resource Management. He held both of these teaching and research positions until 1990 when he moved to Harvard Business School.