Videos
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MIT Professor Reveals Game-Changing Business Solutions | Dr. Nelson Repenning -
#317 How to Reengineer Your Business Processes with Nelson Repenning & Don Kieffer, MIT
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Discover Dynamic Work Design with MIT's Nelson Repenning
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Improving Organizational Processes with Dynamic Work Design
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iLead Speaker Series: Ruby Chandy -
What is Organizational Capability?
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iLead Speaker Series: Martha S. Samuelson, SF '86, CEO and Rebecca Kirk Fair
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A Structured Approach to Problem Solving | MIT Sloan on Business Strategy
Learn More About Nelson Repenning
Nelson P. Repenning, Ph.D., is the faculty director of the MIT Leadership Center, and the School of Management Distinguished Professor of System Dynamics and Organization Studies at the MIT Sloan School of Management.
His early work focused on understanding the inability of organizations to leverage well-established tools and practices. He has worked extensively with organizations trying to develop new capabilities in both manufacturing and new product development. Repenning has also studied the failure to use the safety practices that often lead to industrial accidents and has helped investigate several major incidents. This line of research has been recognized with several awards, including best paper recognition from both the California Management Review and the Journal of Product Innovation Management.
Building on his earlier work, Repenning now focuses on developing the theory and practice of Dynamic Work Design – a new approach to designing work that is both effective and engaging – and Dynamic Management Systems, a method for ensuring that day-to-day work is tightly linked to the strategic objectives of the firm. His book (co-authored with Don Kieffer) “There’s Got to Be a Better Way” (Public Affairs, August 2025), describes Dynamic Work Design in detail. He is also a partner at ShiftGear Work Design and serves as its chief social scientist.
In 2003, Repenning received the International System Dynamics Society’s Jay Wright Forrester Award, which recognizes the best work in the field in the previous five years. In 2011 he received the Jamieson Prize for Excellence in Teaching. He was recently recognized by Poets and Quants as one of the country’s top instructors in executive education.
He holds a B.A. in economics from Colorado College and a Ph.D. in operations management and system dynamics from MIT.
Nelson P. Repenning is available to advise your organization via virtual and in-person consulting meetings, interactive workshops and customized keynotes through the exclusive representation of Stern Speakers & Advisors, a division of Stern Strategy Group®.
There’s Got to Be a Better Way: How to Calm Chaos and Accelerate Productivity, Innovation and Engagement
When organizations become overloaded, either because of their own success or because of external forces in the market, chaos grows and productivity falls. People must work harder to get things done and work moves more slowly through the system, prompting a greater sense of urgency, shifting priorities and slower delivery times. As results decline, employees at every level become exhausted and demoralized. According to faculty director of the MIT Leadership Center Nelson Repenning, Ph.D., getting clear on the real problem before launching change is critical. Boilerplate change initiatives involving rules, tools and rituals based on case studies and generic problems often layer more work on top of a struggling workforce rather than addressing the unique set of issues causing the problem. In this eye-opening presentation, Repenning draws on his latest book, “There’s Got to Be a Better Way,” to detail how the principles-based framework of Dynamic Work Design can reveal the real problems that are causing poor results, while providing an approach that quickly fixes the work and puts points on the board. Attendees will learn the five principles of Dynamic Work Design, and the approach to applying them. With a plain-spoken, accessible style, Repenning reveals classic, proven methods of productivity, innovation and engagement while simultaneously preserving company structures and culture.
Lead With Discovery and Learning to Achieve Truly Effective Change
Many times, organizational change initiatives arrive with much fanfare – t-shirts, coffee mugs and banners for all – but without much understanding of why a change was needed in the first place. According to Nelson Repenning, Ph.D., faculty director of the MIT Leadership Center, rather than rushing into a change project, it’s vital for leaders to take a bottom-up approach to understand how work actually gets done in their company. In this revealing presentation, Repenning demonstrates that it’s easier to insert new knowledge or technology where it makes sense when executives lead with discovery and learning, not with rushed roll outs of big projects. By resisting the urge to inject more work for the organization, audiences leave better prepared to enact change in a much more surgical way, better preserving company culture and being more prepared to manage future crises.
Praise for "There's Got to Be a Better Way"
“'There’s Got to be a Better Way' indeed offers one. Blending expertise in system dynamics and behavioral science, along with decades of real-world practical experience, authors Nelson Repenning and Don Kieffer teamed up to write this groundbreaking new book. In it, they describe a compellingly actionable learning process for solving the most perplexing and persistent problems that plague every large organization. A must-read for leaders in any industry facing complexity, uncertainty, and pressure for results.”
“There is a better way! I’ve seen it, and I promise you it’s possible. Overloaded, over regulated organizations are not only wildly inefficient—there are absolutely no fun to work in. In this eminently practical and deeply grounded book, Nelson Repenning and Don Kieffer draw on their decades of experience to show us all how we can build the kind of creative, extraordinarily productive workplaces most people only dream about.”
“A road map to eliminating inefficiencies and busting bureaucracies. Drawing on rigorous research and rich experience inside a wide range of workplaces, Nelson Repenning and Donald Kieffer reveal how to redesign work to do more in less time.”
“Repenning and Kieffer are absolutely right: there's got to be a better way to work than what we’re doing now! Fortunately, their theory of dynamic work design offers exactly the type of compelling alternative we’ve been so desperately searching for.”
“If you want to solve the business problem you thought was unsolvable, look no further than this incisive new book, which presents a smart new way to unlock fast fixes to your once intractable challenges. It’s a mindset makeover!”
“The most useful book on creating enduring organizational change I have ever read. This masterpiece shows why, when leaders try to change organizations for the better, they so often make things worse by focusing on fighting fires rather than fixing root causes. 'There’s Got to Be a Better Way' shows how savvy leaders can, instead, solve the right problems and build organizations that are consistently innovative, resilient, and reliable.”
“'There’s Got to Be a Better Way' emphasizes the power of dynamic leadership in the fast-paced world we live in. This is a great roadmap for learning how to identify core challenges, embrace flexibility, and experiment with new ideas to refine processes that have been holding your team back. Understanding how to swiftly identify the issue will allow leaders to pivot quickly—or boldly move in a different direction—without the fear of failure. Problem-solving in this way will ultimately drive long-term success and collaboration.”
“In 'There’s Got to Be a Better Way,' Nelson Repenning and Donald Kieffer deliver a compelling roadmap for overcoming organizational inertia. With a wealth of real-world case studies and a proven framework, the authors introduce Dynamic Work Design—a practical, principle-driven approach that helps leaders unlock efficiency, drive sustainable change, and foster innovation. This book is essential reading for executives seeking to turn workplace frustration into high-impact results.”
“Using five fundamental principles, Nelson Repenning and Don Kieffer show how any organization can use their insightful methods to get stuff done faster, better, and with less effort. Repenning and Kieffer bring an engineer’s perspective to business problems, giving organizations methods to diagnose and solve their own challenges in ways that uniquely work for them. At Fannie Mae, we applied these methods and improved our company immeasurably. Their teachings worked for us, and they can work for you.”
“This book is a must-read for all leaders of organizations—big and small, private and non-profit, newly founded and well-established. It should be required of all students of organizational behavior. Building on decades of research and consulting, Repenning and Kieffer show how their dynamic work design approach can address long-standing organizational issues while also stimulating a reinforcing cycle of learning and innovation. Drawing on examples from an array of different organizations—industrial conglomerates, research laboratories, hospitals, and even shelters for at-risk women—'There’s Got To Be a Better Way' illustrates how their disciplined approach actually works in practice and drives results. This is the very best management book I have read in years.”
“A masterful book that avoids the buzzwords common to the genre, providing actionable methods for removing frustration points and bottlenecks in order to make organizations more productive and more rewarding to work in. Repenning and Kieffer’s methods can help reveal incorrect assumptions and blind spots that stop us from identifying and solving the right problems.”
“Starting with the Human Genome Project, the Broad Institute has always embraced bold challenges to accelerate biomedicine. Ever since we learned from Nelson Repenning and Don Kieffer about Dynamic Work Design over thirteen years ago, it’s been our foundation for continuous transformation of our Genomics Platform. When we applied it at the start of the COVID pandemic, it helped us deliver over 37 million tests, with turnaround under 24 hours and a cost far below commercial operations. It’s been essential to so much of what we’ve done.”
