Natalie Hanson, Ph.D.

Speaking & Writing

Building what scaling companies need next.

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Presentations

Talks and conference presentations on product strategy, user experience, organizational design, and applied anthropology.

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Podcasts & Press

Podcast appearances and interviews on building product organizations, the anthropologist-as-operator, and what it takes to scale.

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Podcasts & Press

Podcast appearances and interviews on building product organizations, the anthropologist-as-operator, and what it takes to scale.

  • EPIC 2008

    Over the years, it’s been harder and harder to find academic or industry conferences that I really enjoy and learn from.  The American Anthropology Association has so much infighting, and SO little support for practicing anthropologists that I haven’t attended in a few years.  I’ve even stopped my membership, because they have the gall to charge… Read More ->

  • Sustaining Stories

    Abstract Ethnographers, in a sense, play the role of story creators and storytellers.  For “in-house” ethnographers engaged in the long-term work of making sense of and contributing to organizations, a challenge emerges: discovering and managing the retrospective and prospective meaning of their storytelling. The narratives produced in these contexts – and the fieldwork from which… Read More ->

  • Consuming Work, Producing Self – Chapter Summaries

    This dissertation will describe the how practices of employee control in the corporation reflect both the changing global context and specific, local forces at play in one U.S. high tech corporation.  The chapters are organized to some degree around Foucault’s four arenas of power (see pages 7 through 10 of the Introduction), though there are almost… Read More ->

  • Consuming Work, Producing Self: Market Discourse in Dispersed Knowledge Work

    This page provides video clips and a short summary of my dissertation defense, which I delivered as part of the requirements for my Ph.D. in Cultural Anthropology in June 2004.  You can also read Chapter Summaries and download my dissertation if you’re interested.   Consuming Work, Producing Self: Market Discourse in Dispersed Knowledge Work Presentation Video… Read More ->

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Building what scaling companies need next.

© 2026 Natalie Hanson