Hershfield completed his Ph.D. at Stanford and a post-doc at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University before teaching undergraduates at NYU Stern. He is now Professor of Marketing, Behavioral Decision Making, and Psychology at UCLA Anderson, and holds the UCLA Anderson Board of Advisors Term Chair in Management. The business school environment, he says, affords collaborations with larger firms as well as financial tech startups, and Hershfield is routinely approached by industry. He has been a consultant to Prudential’s “Bring Your Challenges” campaign, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Merrill Lynch, the Principal Financial Group and many other organizations.
In the classroom, Hershfield strives to create an inclusive environment in which deep learnings are accomplished in a fun way. “Whatever teaching I do has to be enjoyable for the students and for me,” he says. Pop culture examples abound and provide lessons that are effective because they resonate outside specialized frameworks.
