Dr. Robinson speaking at The Plug Insights Innovation Summit (February 2020)
Jeffrey A. Robinson, Ph.D. is an award winning business school professor, international speaker and entrepreneur. Since 2008, he has been a leading faculty member at Rutgers Business School where he is an associate professor of management and entrepreneurship. In 2021 he was appointed to be the Prudential Chair in Business and since 2013 he has been the Academic Director of The Center for Urban Entrepreneurship & Economic Development , Dr. Robinson is also the Director of Special Programs at the Rutgers Advanced Institute for the Study of Entrepreneurship & Development, research fellow of the Rutgers Institute for Corporate Social Innovation.
Dr. Robinson is the author of many articles and books on the topics of organization theory, entrepreneurship and workforce diversity. He is the co-author along with Dr. Randal Pinkett of Black Faces in White Places: 10 Game-Changing Strategies to Achieve Success and Find Greatness (20q0, 2018) and the recently released Black Faces in High Places: 10 Strategic Actions for Black Professionals to Reach the Top and Stay There (2022).
As a result of his work, Dr. Robinson is a sought after speaker and trainer in many Fortune 1000 Corporations, foundations and leading social sector organizations including Wells Fargo, Comcast, KIPP Schools, Raytheon, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Novartis, The National Urban League and the National Association for Multi-Ethnicity in Communications (NAMIC). Dr. Robinson is a media commentator appearing on Dateline NBC and NBC Nightly News, PBS, NJN News, Marketplace on Public Radio International, Black Enterprise, NJ Biz, and The New York Times.
Through his research, business ownership and community activities he makes direct impacts entrepreneurship and economic development policy and practice in the state of New Jersey and beyond.
Scholar
Dr. Robinson is an accomplished scholar. His research specialty can be described as the being at the intersection of business and society. His work addresses community and economic development issues for urban metropolitan areas in the United States and abroad. He has grant funded research projects on high growth oriented African American women entrepreneurs and early stage social entrepreneurial ventures. He is the co-editor (with Johanna Mair and Kai Hockerts) of the research volumes Social Entrepreneurship International Perspectives in Social Entrepreneurship, and Values and Opportunities in Social Entrepreneurship. His most recent manuscripts are related to inclusive innovation efforts and minority technology entrepreneurs. In 2007, he was selected as the recipient of the Aspen Institute’s Social Impact Faculty Pioneer Award for his research, service and teaching activities at the intersection of entrepreneurship and society. In 2011, his course, Urban Entrepreneurship & Economic Development, was recognized as a model of Innovative Entrepreneurship Education by the U.S. Association of Small Business and Entrepreneurship.
Dr. Robinson has been on the faculty of the Leonard N. Stern School of Business of New York University and Loyola University of Maryland prior to arriving at Rutgers Business. He has been the keynote speaker at international events and conferences in Shanghai, China; Nairobi, Kenya; Moscow, Russia; Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; Melbourne, Australia; Moscow, Russia and London, England and has taught or presented his work on six continents. Since 2013 he has participated as a speaker in the public diplomacy program of the U.S. State Department.
He has completed five degrees in the areas of engineering, urban studies and business. At Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, he completed a Bachelor of Arts in Urban Studies at Rutgers College and a Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering at Rutgers College of Engineering. He has a Master of Science in Civil Engineering Management from Georgia Institute of Technology and an M. Phil. and a Ph.D. in Management and Organizations at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Business.
Entrepreneur
Dr. Robinson is a 3rd generation entrepreneur. He is the co-founder of BCT Partners, a multi-million dollar firm that provides management, technology and policy consulting to non-profits, foundations, corporations and various government entities as they plan and implement change strategies and improve organizational effectiveness. Through BCT he has worked on numerous community technology and community building projects in the New Jersey, and the cities of New York, Baltimore, and Atlanta. He advises several social ventures and operated, Eden Organix, an eco-conscious day spa and retailer of organic skin and beauty products with his wife Valerie Mason-Robinson from 2008 to 2015. Most recently, the Robinsons have launched an eco-conscious beauty product line called Lovely Blessed Body.
Dr. Robinson is also the President and CEO of Jeffrey A Robinson International LLC, a consulting company that specializes in management, entrepreneurship and organizational development. He has consulted to corporations and growing businesses as they plan and implement programs and initiatives in four areas: organizational development, workforce diversity, supplier diversity and program evaluation. He has provided this support as a consultant to executive and managerial level champions in Fortune 500 corporations and other growing businesses in the United States and abroad.
Advocate
Dr. Robinson is a passionate advocate for social entrepreneurship and community economic development. He is particularly committed to supporting community building, entrepreneurship and the development of social ventures. He believes that long lasting change for inner city communities is stimulated when community institutions, business leaders and government entities work together toward the common goal of community revitalization.
Emerging from his pioneering research, the New Jersey Social Entrepreneurship Institute (NJSII) and the CUEED Pipeline to Inclusive Innovation (CUEED PII) are national and international models for economic development and social problem solving using entrepreneurial approaches. The NJ Social Entrepreneurship Institute trains and supports social innovators and entrepreneurs who are seeking to make positive and sustainable social impacts on their communities. The CUEED Pi2peline initiative is federally funded work focused on increasing the number of women and minority inventors, scientists and technology entrepreneurs that are funded for innovation in the U.S. He is a Principal Investigator or co-PI for four National Science Foundation funded research projects on diversity and inclusion in technology entrepreneurship.
Dr. Robinson volunteers his time as a member of the board of the Support Center for Non Profit Management, President of the Sphinx Scholarship Fund, and works with various community organizations to empower, educate and encourage others. He holds life memberships in Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity Incorporated and the National Black MBA Association. He lives in Central New Jersey with his wife, Valerie, and their three children. They are active members of Abundant Life Family Worship Church in New Brunswick, New Jersey.
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Through his research, business ownership and community activities he makes direct impacts entrepreneurship and economic development policy and practice in the state of New Jersey and beyond.