For 30 years, Diana has advised leaders and studied firms that are changing the way people work, think, and live—among them Apple and Herman Miller. In her research, Diana observes leaders and organizations over a period of years and studies her own efforts to transform their leadership and their firms. By reflecting on both her successes and failures, she has come to understand what it takes for leaders to build in themselves and embed in their organizations the ability to innovate, learn, and grow.

Over her career, Diana has worked extensively in the social sector. In the 1970s and 1980s, she launched a community-based program for youth in the South End, helped the leaders of Nine-to-Five build their organization, volunteered at the Boston Community Schools, and worked as a counselor at a nationally recognized community mental health center. More recently, in addition to her work with New Profit, she has advised the leaders of Citizen Schools and Right to Play.

Her most recent book, The Elephant in the Room, shows how relationships affect the success of leaders and organizations. Diana's other writings can be found in California Management Review ("Too Hot to Handle? How to Manage Relationship Conflict" co-authored with HBS Professor Amy Edmondson), Peter Senge's The Dance of Change, and Brown and Wiig's Corporate Communication ("Keeping a Strategic Dialogue Moving"). She is also the author of Divide or Conquer: How Great Teams Turn Conflict into a Strength, and the co-author of Action Science, a seminal text on intervention theory and research (with Chris Argyris and Robert Putnam).

She received her masters' and doctoral degrees in consulting psychology at Harvard University.