Lærke Højgaard Christiansen

Lærke Højgaard Christiansen serves as Associate Professor and interim Head of Section in the Organisation Science and Technology section at the Department of Technology, Management and Economics, Technical University of Denmark (DTU). Her research focuses on understanding how organizations engage with social issues and institutionalization processes, particularly examining how organizations innovate and experiment with new ways of managing complex societal challenges.

Her research interests include:

• Organization theory and institutionalization processes
• How organizations change and innovate when engaging with social issues
• The role of material artifacts and visual representations in institutionalizing innovations
• Diversity and gender issues in technology entrepreneurship, with particular focus on the Danish tech industry
• Social-symbolic work around diversity challenges as a form of organizational change

Dr. Christiansen's recent scholarly work demonstrates a strong focus on how organizations address 'wicked problems' - complex social issues that resist straightforward solutions. Her publications reveal a consistent thread examining diversity challenges in the technology industry, exploring how female role models function as change tactics and how the Danish tech industry engages in social-symbolic work around diversity issues. She also investigates business collective action frameworks for addressing industry-wide challenges, with particular attention to the alcohol industry's engagement with social responsibility issues.

Dr. Christiansen leads and participates in significant research projects including 'Diversity in Technology: Finding New Ways to Solve Wicked Problems' (2022-2026) and serves as Main Supervisor for the PhD project 'Solving wicked problems: Diversity and identities at work in social innovation processes' (2022-2025). She actively contributes to the academic community through conference presentations at the Academy of Management Annual Meeting and OS Workshops, and serves on review committees for academic events.