Adam Seth Litwin

People/Faculty
Associate Professor of Industrial & Labor Relations
Global Labor and Work
Director of Graduate Studies
Dean's Office
Associate Editor, ILR Review
ILR Review
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Contact

133 Statler Dr
369 Ives Hall Faculty Wing
Ithaca, NY 14853
United States

Tel
+1 (607) 2557326
CV
litwin-cv-031526.pdf
Websites
Prof. Litwin's Scholarly Papers at the Social Science Research Network
Overview

Adam Seth Litwin is Associate Professor of Industrial and Labor Relations, Stephen H. Weiss Junior Fellow, and director of the PhD program/director of graduate studies (DGS) at Cornell’s ILR School. Over his 2022-2023 sabbatical, he served as the J. William Fulbright Visiting Professor of Work and Organisational Studies at the University of Sydney in Australia. Litwin’s research, anchored in industrial relations, examines the determinants and impact of labor relations structures and technological change. As a technologist, Litwin also writes on issues involving technological change, work, and workers in the healthcare sector, having been honored by the Aspen Institute, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, the Labor and Employment Relations Association, and the International Labor and Employment Relations Association, among others. He also served as an associate editor of the Industrial and Labor Relations Review from 2018-2025 and oversaw its ongoing special call for research on the workplace and labor market impact of novel technologies.

Litwin has published a mix of empirical and conceptual studies intersecting the areas of labor relations and technological change, in both industrial relations and medical journals, including the Industrial and Labor Relations Review, Industrial Relations, the British Journal of Industrial Relations, Advances in Industrial and Labor Relations, Human Resource Management, Applied Clinical Informatics, and the International Review of Psychiatry. His pedagogy has been recognized with an “Ideas Worth Teaching” Award from the Aspen Institute Business & Society Program, the ILR School’s Duncan M. MacIntyre Award for Exemplary Teaching, and the Stephen H. Weiss Junior Fellowship. The latter is awarded by Cornell’s provost and Dean of Faculty. At Cornell, he teaches undergraduate and graduate core courses in labor relations as well as electives focused on the evolution and impact of technological change on workers, organizations, and society-at-large.

Litwin joined Cornell’s ILR faculty in the fall of 2014 after serving as a standing faculty member at Johns Hopkins University, where he held appointments in the Carey Business School and the School of Medicine. Before earning his PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Litwin conducted research on industrial relations institutions in Great Britain as a Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Fellow at the London School of Economics. He also put in time “inside the beltway” as a research assistant at the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System in Washington.

Publications

Journal Articles

  • , , , & . . Collective Voices, Healthier Outcomes: The Union Effect in American Healthcare. npj Health Systems.
  • , & . . A Forum on Workplace AI Regulation Around the World. Industrial and Labor Relations Review, 75(4), 807-815.
  • , & . . Varieties of AI Regulations: The United States Perspective. Industrial and Labor Relations Review, 77(5), 799-812.
  • . . Leveraging Technological Change to Address Racial Injustice and Worker Shortages in Frontline Care Delivery. BMJ Leader, 6(3), 228-232.
  • . . Technological Change and Frontline Care Delivery Work: Toward the Quadruple Aim. Advances in Health Care Management, 20, 99-142.
  • . . Technological Change on the Frontlines of Health Care Delivery. Industrial and Labor Relations Review, 75(4), 829-838.
  • , & . . What Do Unions Do...for Temps? Collective Bargaining and the Wage Penalty. Industrial Relations, 61(2), 193-227.
  • , & . . Information Technology, Business Strategy and the Reassignment of Work from In-House Employees to Agency Temps. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 59(3), 816-847.
  • , , , & . . Editorial Essay: Paying the Price for a Broken Healthcare System: Rethinking Employment, Labor, and Work in a Post-Pandemic World. Work and Occupations.
  • , & . . Complementary or Conflictual? Formal Participation, Informal Participation, and Organizational Performance. Human Resource Management, 57(1), 307-325.
  • . . Collective Bargaining and Technological Investment: The Case of Nurses’ Unions and the Transition from Paper-Based to Electronic Health Records. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 55(4), 802-830.
  • , , & . . Superbugs vs. Outsourced Cleaners: Employment Arrangements and the Spread of Healthcare-Associated Infections. Industrial and Labor Relations Review, 70(3), 610-641.
  • , , , & . . Editorial Essay: Introduction to a Special Issue on Work and Employment Relations in Health Care. Industrial and Labor Relations Review, 69(4), 787-802.
  • . . Nose to Tail: Using the Whole Employment Relationship to Link Worker Participation to Operational Performance. Advances in Industrial and Labor Relations, 21, 143-176.
  • , & . . Justice or Just between Us? Empirical Evidence of the Trade-Off between Procedural and Interactional Justice in Workplace Dispute Resolution. Industrial and Labor Relations Review, 67(1), 171-201.
  • . . Not Featherbedding, but Feathering the Nest: Human Resource Management and Investments in Information Technology. Industrial Relations, 52(1), 22-52.
  • , , & . . Explaining the Health Information Technology Paradox. Perspectives on Work, 17(1-2), 15-18.
  • , , & . . Drivers and Barriers in Health IT Adoption: A Proposed Framework. Applied Clinical Informatics, 3(4), 488-500.
  • , , & . . Measurement Error in Performance Studies of Health Information Technology: Lessons from the Management Literature. Applied Clinical Informatics, 3(2), 210-220.
  • , & . . Quality over Quantity: Reexamining the Link between Entrepreneurship and Job Creation. Industrial and Labor Relations Review, 66(4), 833-873.
  • , , & . . The Quality of Jobs Created by Entrepreneurs. Perspectives on Work, 16(1-2), 13-16.
  • . . Technological Change at Work: The Impact of Employee Involvement on the Effectiveness of Health Information Technology. Industrial and Labor Relations Review, 64(5), 863-888.
  • , & . . Rethinking Work and Family: The Making and Taking of Parental Leave in Australia. International Review of Psychiatry, 17(5), 385-400.
  • , , , & . . Counting the Global Aerospace Workforce. Perspectives on Work, 7(2), 13-15.

Book Chapters

  • . . Technological Change and the Pluralist Turn in the Age of AI. In Collective Voice in the 21st Century: Advancing Social Justice at Work. Cornell University Press.
  • . . Confronting Technological Change on the Frontlines of Health Care Delivery. In Research Handbook on Contemporary Human Resource Management for Health Care. (pp. 90-107). Edward Elgar.
  • , & . . The Future of Human Capital: An Employment Relations Perspective. In Oxford Handbook of Human Capital. (pp. 647-670). Oxford University Press.

Honors and Awards

  • Stephen H. Weiss Junior Fellow, Office of the Provost and Dean of Faculty, Cornell University.
  • Bringing Worker Voice into the Development, Design, and Use of Artificial Intelligence, research grant awarded by the Washington Center for Equitable Growth.
  • What Do Unions Do in Healthcare?, research grant awarded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
  • Fulbright U.S. Scholarship Award, J. William Fulbright Scholarship Board/Institute of International Education’s Council for International Exchange of Scholars (IIE/CIES).
  • The Impact of Technological Change on Work and Workers in the U.S. Healthcare Sector, research grant awarded by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation.
  • Luis Aparicio Prize, International Labour and Employment Relations Association.
  • Ralph Gomory Best Industry Studies Paper Award, Industry Studies Association.
  • “Ideas Worth Teaching”, Aspen Institute, Business & Society Program.
  • Duncan M. MacIntyre Award for Exemplary Teaching, Cornell University—LR School.
  • “Technology and the Evolution of Work” theme project selection/grantee (for “The Impact of Technological Change on Work and Workers in Healthcare: An Industry Studies Approach”), Cornell University—ILR School.
  • John T. Dunlop Outstanding Young Scholar Award, Labor and Employment Relations Association.
  • (Inaugural) Kauffman Firm Survey Contributor Award, Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation.
  • First place, doctoral dissertation prize, Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

Adam Seth Litwin In the News

‘Do you want some privacy with that?’

HR Report
ILR Associate Professor Adam Seth Litwin provides extensive expert analysis of the new “Patty” AI assistant that Restaurant Brands International plans to roll out later this year to employee headsets.
‘Do you want some privacy with that?’

Hollywood’s Deal With Screenwriters Just Rewrote the Rules Around A.I.

The New York Times
Professor Adam Seth Litwin explores the impacts of AI on Hollywood writers and their efforts to negotiate its use.
Hollywood’s Deal With Screenwriters Just Rewrote the Rules Around A.I.

This 23-Year-Old AI Entrepreneur Has a Brazen Plan to Eliminate Boring Jobs. Why It Might Work

Inc.
“Employers are really anxious to cut payroll,” explains Professor Adam Seth Litwin. “Now technology and automation is coming after white collar jobs.”
This 23-Year-Old AI Entrepreneur Has a Brazen Plan to Eliminate Boring Jobs. Why It Might Work
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