Ordway Tead


Ordway Tead was an American organizational theorist, adjunct professor of industrial relations at Columbia University, chair of the New York Board of Higher Education, and first president of the Society for Advancement of Management in 1936–37.

Biography

Tead was born in Sommerville, Massachusetts and attended Amherst College from where he obtained his AB 1912. In 1915 he married Clara Murohy, long term president of Briarcliff College.
After his graduation he served as fellow of the Amherst College from 1912 to 1914. In 1915 he co-founded Valentine, Tead & Gregg, an industrial consultants' firm in Boston, Massachusetts. In 1917 he accepted a position in the Bureau of Industrial Research in New York City. Following the U.S.A.'s entry into the First World War he ran the War Department's employment management course at Columbia University.
Tead continued to teach at Columbia University from 1920 to 1950 and was adjunct professor of industrial relations until 1956. From 1938 to 1953 he was chair of the New York Board of Higher Education, where in 1941 he was involved in sacking any faculty staff who belonged to a Communist, Fascist or Nazi organization.
In the year 1936-37 Tead served as first president of the Society for Advancement of Management in 1936-37, where he was succeeded by William H. Gesell. He was actively involved in book publishing both at McGraw Hill and Harper & Row and wrote 21 books himself.

Publications

;Articles, a selection