Dr. Karen Hardy is a Visiting Scholar at Strayer University. She has over 20 years of experience in the public sector, ten years in the area of internal control and risk management, and spent several years in the private sector in commercial banking. Hardy is the author of a multitude of publications including the book Building Self-Leaders, which takes a look at the management succession process in the federal government and provides a model training program for addressing leadership issues.

Hardy is a scholar-practitioner and social scientist focusing on research in the areas of leadership and business. She has collaborated with researchers at Virginia Tech University in expanding self-leadership theory and practice.

Her research has been cited and published in the Journal of Managerial Psychology and featured in Government Executive Magazine. She has written articles for The Public Manager and FedTech Magazine. Hardy is a member of the Federal Executive Steering Group for Enterprise Risk Management and of the FederalERM.com community. She is also a member of the Academy of Human Resource Development and the Phi Gamma Sigma Professional Society. Hardy earned her doctorate in Organizational Leadership and Human Resource Development from Nova Southeastern University and her Masters in Business Administration from Strayer University