Paula Thompson, Ed.D.

Paula is an expert on how individuals manage their careers and their job performance to achieve desired professional outcomes. She has been an ICF certified coach since 2014, and she coaches leaders in higher education, academic medicine, and business. Paula’s coaching approach incorporates the best scientific evidence from positive psychology and organizational effectiveness to support leaders in thriving even during difficult times and ever-changing work environments.

Paula’s faculty appointment is at the Pepperdine Graduate School of Education and Psychology. Her courses include organization design and culture; organization change, creativity, and innovation; qualitative data analysis; and scholarly writing. She also serves as a dissertation chair and has over a dozen graduates. Her areas of intellectual interest are applying positive psychology in the workplace, coaching for leadership development, and the internal – and often hidden – aspects of work performance.

In prior leadership roles at two universities, Paula specialized in the continuous improvement of systems to support faculty success. As an Assistant Dean for Faculty Affairs at the University of Southern California, her emphasis was on modernizing processes and technologies, developing interdisciplinary communities, and making policies and procedures more transparent. As the Program Director for Faculty Development at the Duke University School of Medicine, she designed and implemented mentorship programs, trainings, and policy development. This role focused on career development for junior faculty as well as women and emerging leaders. She also served on the Provost’s Council on Equity and Diversity.

Paula has a doctorate in organization change from Pepperdine University, a master’s in public health from the University of California Los Angeles, and an undergraduate degree in biology with minors in psychology and women’s studies from Washington University in St. Louis.