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Erin L. Frey

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Erin L. Frey
NationalityAmerican
OccupationOrganizational behavior scholar, university professor
Known forResearch on failure, recovery, and second chances in organizations; studies of transgressor reintegration and rehabilitation
EducationPh.D. in Organizational Behavior, Harvard Business School; B.A., Harvard College
Websitehttps://som.yale.edu/faculty-research/faculty-directory/erin-l-frey

Erin L. Frey is an American organizational behavior scholar who serves as an Assistant Professor of Organizational Behavior at the Yale School of Management, Yale University. Her research examines how, when, and why individuals, groups, and industries fail, and what they can do afterward to recover, with a particular focus on how people obtain second chances within organizations.[1][2] Using both qualitative and experimental methods, she has studied failure, recovery, and second chances across a range of settings, including the military, scientific organizations, the entertainment industry, and among individuals who have been convicted of white-collar crime.[1]

Education

Frey completed her undergraduate studies at Harvard College, earning a Bachelor of Arts in Environmental Science and Public Policy with a secondary field in Economics, which she attended from 2004 to 2008.[2][1] She subsequently studied at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University between 2010 and 2013.[2]

She earned her Ph.D. in Organizational Behavior from Harvard Business School, where she was a doctoral student from 2013 to 2018.[2] Her doctoral and postdoctoral work established the research agenda on organizational transgression, punishment, and reintegration that she has continued to develop across her career.[2][3]

Academic career

After completing her Ph.D., Frey held a position as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Darden School of Business, University of Virginia, from 2018 to 2021.[2] During this period she was affiliated with research supported by the Darden Batten Institute, which awarded her a research grant for work related to entrepreneurship.[2]

From 2021 to 2024, Frey was an Assistant Professor at the Marshall School of Business, University of Southern California, where she taught courses in organizational behavior, experimental design, and managerial perspectives.[2] In 2024 she joined the Yale School of Management as an Assistant Professor of Organizational Behavior.[1][2] At Yale she has taught a graduate-level Negotiations course in the MBA program.[2]

Frey has served as an editorial board member of the journal Organization Science since 2023 and has acted as an ad hoc reviewer for journals including the Academy of Management Journal, the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, and the Journal of Business Ethics.[2]

Research

Frey's research uses both qualitative and quantitative methods to understand how organizational members respond to and recover from scandals, failures, and challenges in organizations. She is particularly interested in understanding when, why, and how people receive second chances in organizations.[2][1]

Transgression, punishment, and reintegration

A central strand of Frey's work concerns how organizations respond to members who have violated important standards and how those individuals are subsequently reintegrated. In "'I Go Here…But I Don't Necessarily Belong': The Process of Transgressor Reintegration in Organizations," published in the Academy of Management Journal in 2022, she examined what happens when organizational members violate important standards, are retained by the organization, and are given a second chance. The study explored how retained transgressors experience the tension of liminality, maintaining their affiliation to the organization as structural insiders while remaining moral outsiders as a result of their transgression, drawing on waves of qualitative data collected at a military service academy.[4]

In "Scarlet Letters: Rehabilitation Through Transgression Transparency and Personal Narrative Control," published in Administrative Science Quarterly in 2022 and co-authored with Ethan Bernstein and Nick Rekenthaler, Frey investigated whether organizations can use transparency about a transgression to rehabilitate transgressors. The paper drew on a longitudinal, qualitative dataset of similarly situated transgressors at a military academy that added transparency to traditional punishment by requiring transgressors to wear a pin signaling their transgression. The authors reported that, rather than prompting persistent stigmatization, social awareness of the transgression prompted inquiry from others and gradually engaged transgressors in a process the authors termed personal narrative control, through which a mutually acceptable account of the transgression could be developed.[3]

Punishment and organizational behavior

Frey has also examined punishment as an organizational phenomenon. In "What We (Do Not) Know About Punishment Across Organizational Boundaries," published in the Journal of Management in 2023 and co-authored with Gabrielle S. Adams, Jeffrey Pfeffer, and Peter Belmi, she reviewed and synthesized scholarship on how punishment operates across different organizational contexts.[2] In related applied work, she co-authored "'Braking' Bad: How Managers Can Respond to Employee Misbehavior," published in Behavioral Science & Policy in 2022 with Gabrielle S. Adams, Evan Bruno, and James Detert.[2]

Her broader body of published work spans topics including entrepreneurial learning, the effects of financial scarcity on daily distress, and the persistence of behavioral treatment effects after interventions end. Her 2024 article "From Negative Emotions to Entrepreneurial Mindset: A Model of Learning Through Experiential Entrepreneurship Education," co-authored with Eliana Crosina, Andrew Corbett, and Danna Greenberg, appeared in Academy of Management Learning & Education.[2] Earlier work co-authored with Todd Rogers on how treatment effects persist after interventions stop was published in Policy Insights from the Behavioral and Brain Sciences in 2014.[2]

White Collar Conference

In 2025, Frey presented research titled "Professional and Personal Restoration," which was conducted with the White Collar Support Group, as a speaker at the White Collar Conference.[5] The topic aligned with her broader research on how individuals recover professionally and personally after failures, including her documented study of failure and recovery among individuals who have been convicted of white-collar crime.[1]

Selected publications

  • Crosina, E., Frey, E., Corbett, A., & Greenberg, D. (2024). "From Negative Emotions to Entrepreneurial Mindset: A Model of Learning Through Experiential Entrepreneurship Education." Academy of Management Learning & Education, 23(1), 88–127.[2]
  • Frey, E., Adams, G. S., Pfeffer, J., & Belmi, P. (2023). "What We (Do Not) Know About Punishment Across Organizational Boundaries." Journal of Management, 49(1), 196–236.[2]
  • Frey, E., Bernstein, E., & Rekenthaler, N. (2022). "Scarlet Letters: Rehabilitation Through Transgression Transparency and Personal Narrative Control." Administrative Science Quarterly, 67(4), 968–1011.[3]
  • Frey, E. (2022). "'I Go Here…But I Don't Necessarily Belong': The Process of Transgressor Reintegration in Organizations." Academy of Management Journal, 65(1), 119–157.[4]
  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 "Erin L. Frey". 'Yale School of Management}'. Retrieved 2026-07-23.
  2. ↑ 2.00 2.01 2.02 2.03 2.04 2.05 2.06 2.07 2.08 2.09 2.10 2.11 2.12 2.13 2.14 2.15 2.16 2.17 "Erin L. Frey — Academic Curriculum Vitae (May 2025)". 'Yale School of Management}'. Retrieved 2026-07-23.
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 "Scarlet Letters: Rehabilitation Through Transgression Transparency and Personal Narrative Control". 'Administrative Science Quarterly}'. Retrieved 2026-07-23.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 ""I Go Here…But I Don't Necessarily Belong": The Process of Transgressor Reintegration in Organizations". 'Academy of Management Journal}'. Retrieved 2026-07-23.
  5. ↑ "Erin L. Frey — White Collar Conference". 'White Collar Conference}'. Retrieved 2026-07-23.
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