An OR Society Undergraduate Award has been made to a group of four Strathclyde Business School students for their dissertation which looked at modelling the factors influencing AI-related business decisions.
Matthew Cohn, Fraser Maclean, Benjamin Malcolm and Josh McKay won the award for Strathclyde for completing the best OR project. Since graduating, some of the students have secured graduate positions in banking and business analysis. One student is working with a start-up business, whilst the other is taking some time to travel before applying for analysis/consulting roles.
Their project looked at the applicability and adoption of Artificial Intelligence (AI) within an enterprise context. In particular, the research aimed to provide business practitioners with an understanding of how to increase the likelihood of AI project successes.
Each of the students received a certificate, £50, the opportunity to present an overview of their project at The OR Society’s Education and Research Seminar, have their project published on The OR Society's website, and an article in Inside OR magazine.
Dr Aylin Ates, Hunter Centre for Entrepreneurship, was recently selected as an expert in organisational resilience by the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation’s (UNIDO) Learning and Knowledge Development Facility (LKDF) and, as part of her association with the group, has been invited to write an article on SME resilience for the UNIDO website.
The article has now been published on their website: https://iap.unido.org/articles/small-and-medium-enterprises-resilience-and-viability-turbulent-times and appeared on the Strathclyde Business School blog
Strathclyde Business School was delighted to welcome alumnus Paul Taylor, head of International Global Commercial Banking at Bank of America, as speaker at our first lecture this academic year on November 1.
Paul spoke about the current challenges in the world of work. He discussed the potential changes in the future, looked at whether the pandemic has made any permanent changes in the workplace and examined the impact disruptive technologies may have on it.
Paul was well-placed to discuss this topic as, during his time as head of Global Financial Institution Sales for Global Transaction Services at Bank of America, he chaired the employee satisfaction council.
Paul’s talk was followed by a question and answer session as well as a networking and drinks reception thereafter. The event was hybrid for those who could not attend in person.
Professor Eleanor Shaw, Associate Principal, and Professor Mairi Spowage, Director of the Fraser of Allander Institute, won the Services to Education and Services to Accounting & Finance categories respectively at the 4th Scottish Women’s Awards 2022 which were set up to recognise and celebrate Scottish female talent.
The awards were held in Glasgow’s Marriott Hotel on October 27 and they honoured the talent of female professionals across the country, commending women entrepreneurs, businesses and civil servants on their success and contribution to society.
A spokesperson for The Scottish Women’s Awards 2022 said, “We are delighted to bring back The Scottish Women’s Awards and are sure that this year will bring its fair share of brilliant inspiration.
“We are excited to recognise those who are pushing boundaries and showing the world that there is no limit to the things that women can achieve.”
Wendy Pring and Maria Weikum (OSDU) were successful in receiving funding from the Centre of Sustainable Development through the COP26 Legacy Fund for their research project entitled Women’s Perspectives on Skills for Climate Leadership.
Wendy, Enterprise Fellow at the Hunter Centre for Entrepreneurship, and Dr Maria Weikum, Concordat Officer in the Organisational and Staff Development Unit (OSDU), are both participants on the Homeward Bound Programme and got to know each other via this route. The pair are also hopeful to submit another application for funding to build on this initial research topic to further support research into how this can be framed better going forward to accelerate influence on research, policy and industry changes.
The funding of £2,500 was awarded last month.
Climate change decision-making has been approached with a strong unconscious bias for many years owing to male-dominated leadership and an underrepresentation of women and other groups. This is in contrast to findings from a multitude of studies that have highlighted the relevance that diverse voices, in particular those of women, play in tackling climate change. Beyond demonstrating the multi-faceted nature of the impacts of climate change, stronger female participation and leadership, for example, have also been shown to leverage co-benefits across various dimensions of the UN Sustainable Development Goals as well as leading to more stringent action towards sustainable practices.
The project aims to examine the breadth and depth of this bias by amplifying the profile and voice of women in the context of topics of climate change and leadership. This project focuses in particular on the question of what critical skills early-career professionals in research and business need to develop in order to become effective leaders in climate-related areas.
SBS was the location for an ESRC PrOPEL Hub event in September entitled “Managing people for performance and wellbeing: Towards a Sustainable Practice Action Research Community (SPARC) for evidence-based HRM”.
Professor Colin Lindsay, Department of Work, Employment and Organisation and Director of the ESRC PrOPEL Hub said, “Our partnership with the CIPD is a crucial component in our work to engage with HR stakeholders and people managers to turn knowledge into practice. We are committed to ensuring that people managers have access to cutting-edge, robust and actionable research; and that the research community can learn from frontline managers about ‘what’s needed’ in workplace research.
“Our aim with this event was to explore the potential for a network bringing together HR professionals and people managers who want to use the latest evidence to inform their practice; and researchers and academics conducting cutting-edge research on ‘what works’ in people management.”
More than 40 HR leaders, people managers and researchers attended the one-day interactive event.
The morning session involved four interactive mini-keynote sessions, with HR researchers presenting research on current workplace challenges, with opportunities for HR practitioners and other researchers in the audience to share their own insights.
The afternoon session involved a ‘speed’ networking mini-workshop facilitated by Meryl Levington, Knowledge Exchange Manager at CIPD. Researchers from across the UK’s university network made short ‘speed’ presentations on how their research could inform evidence-based HRM. HR stakeholders and people managers shared their key issues and ‘what’s needed’ in terms of future research. The ‘asks’ raised by HR practitioners included the need for further research on: how new technologies such as AI can transform people management; fostering positive intergenerational work relations; the relationship between working patterns and employee wellbeing; and identify good practice in managing hybrid workers.
A key take-away from the day was that there is enthusiasm for a future ‘Sustainable Practice Action Research Community’ (SPARC) that brings together academics and HR practitioners to work together on real-world projects to inform evidence-based practice. The CIPD and the ESRC PrOPEL Hub will work with all stakeholders to identify next steps and to continue to build the community.
Dr Brian Garvey, Department of Work, Employment and Organisation, held meetings in UN Geneva offices with the secretariats for UN Special Rapporteurs on Human Rights, on Human Rights and the Environment and on Human Rights and Toxic Waste on October 18.
The meetings followed from submissions to the UN Universal Periodic Review for Human Rights in Brazil and the submission of individual cases regarding the violations of human rights defenders that have been partners in University of Strathclyde-supported research in Brazil.
The outcome is a commitment to hold open hearings with affected peoples and communities in Brazil's Amazon region, a recent innovation at UN. A submission to a current consultation on the Right to Food via the UN is also in progress.
Dr Brian Garvey and Francis Portes Virginio presented research from the completed ESRC Project, ‘So who is building sustainable development?’ at the Grenoble School of Management, on October 19.
Bianca Pistorio of the Department of Work, Employment and Organisation was successful in a Postgraduate Research travel award to present her work on contemporary slavery and Amazonian deforestation in Sergipe, Brazil, in November.
Professor Matt Hannon, Hunter Centre for Entrepreneurship, gave a Breakfast Session Talk to MSPs at Holyrood on November 10 on behalf of the Scottish Parliament Information Centre on the energy crisis.
The seminar – entitled “The Energy Cost Crisis: where next for Scotland’s energy policy?” was chaired by Net Zero Energy and Transport (NZET) Parliamentary Committee chair Edward Mountain MSP.
The session provided MSPs, parliamentary researchers and special advisers the opportunity to learn more about and discuss the following:
Matthew responded to these questions alongside Professor Stuart Hazeldene of the University of Edinburgh, Professor of Carbon Capture and Storage.
The session was recorded and is now available as a podcast:
https://twitter.com/ScotParl/status/1591725070057103363?s=20&t=mRELidAJS3H3Li-3K5NiqQ
Department of Economics & Fraser of Allander Institute research
Academics from the Department of Economics and Fraser of Allander Institute have been awarded research funding.
An award of £30k a year for two years has been made for a research project “Network Rail – Evaluation Studies”.
They have also received Economic Statistics Centre of Excellence (ESCOE) research funding of over £500k for the first two years. And a project for Balfour Beatty has been awarded to Strathclyde worth £18k. In all three projects, Professor Mairi Spowage is the principal investigator.
Dr Alex Dickson (Economics) is engaged in a Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP) with Coolside Ltd, trading as Trtl, to develop a platform to proactively determine and address ongoing counterfeiting and unauthorised product distribution, with a total value of £235k. The project is being carried out jointly with colleagues in Computer & Information Services (CIS).
Knowledge Transfer Partnerships (KTPs) aim to help businesses improve their competitiveness and productivity through the better use of knowledge, technology and skills within the UK knowledge base. This KTP project was funded by UKRI through Innovate UK.
The University of Strathclyde’s KTPs are managed by the West of Scotland KTP Centre (www.ktpws.org.uk). The Centre has over 27 years’ experience developing and supporting high quality KTPs and is recognised as a UK centre of excellence. Their dedicated KTP team will support businesses from idea to impact.
The Iberdrola MBA cohort 4 participants – who missed out on formal graduation due to the global pandemic – were on campus at the end of September to take part in a celebratory event to mark their graduation. The group were joined by Vicky Kelsall (CEO of Scottish Power Energy Networks) and Nicola Connelly (Control and Administration Director, Scottish Power) who gave inspiring speeches and congratulated participants on their memorable journey and achievements.
Cohort 5 MBA participants joined their Cohort 4 colleagues and engaged in facilitated discussion to share learning, experience and advice and form a collaborative network. This was the first time on the Strathclyde campus for cohort 5 - while the cohort started their studies in 2021 this is the first time they have been able to visit the campus due to Covid 19 restrictions.
The students had an intensive week of studies covering both Project Management and Management Marketing modules led by Dr Steve Paton and Thomas McAlinden.
The group then went on to Madrid where the celebrations continued at Comillas University - our partner institution on the Iberdrola MBA – for cohort 4. A cultural and educational trip to the Almendra and Aldeadávila dams in Salamanca also followed. These hydroelectric facilities are owned and operated by Iberdrola.
The second year of the Help to Grow: Management programme is now well underway at Strathclyde Business School.
Help to Grow is aimed at senior leaders of SMEs and has been created to help drive business performance, employment and to ultimately grow the economy. The course content includes modules on strategy and innovation; digital adoption; internationalisation and winning new markets; vision, mission and values; marketing; branding; organisational design; employee engagement; efficient operations; and finance and financial management.
After the successful graduation of six cohorts which represent 120 companies from across the UK, the second year of the programme is in full swing. The seventh cohort graduated earlier this month, an eighth is currently in progress, having started in October, and a ninth cohort is set to begin at the end of November. The team has received outstanding feedback from their latest group of participants so far, with many of them already describing numerous positive changes that have been brought about in their workplaces as a result of what they have learned on the programme.
The three latest cohorts represent another 60 companies who have put their trust in Strathclyde Business School to deliver this excellent programme which will contribute to their business growth and development. Many of the programme’s latest participants learned about it through word-of-mouth, demonstrating the positive impact that Help to Grow has had on the first six cohorts, who continue to recommend Strathclyde to companies across Scotland. A further three cohorts are planned from January 2023, with the second year concluding in June, and the third year of the programme will begin in August 2023.
The team delivered their first Help to Grow alumni event on September 29 2022 to participants from the first seven cohorts. This event featured talks on digital transformation, and innovation for growth, which were delivered by Professor Dave Mackay and Professor Les Bayne respectively.
The second Help to Grow alumni event takes place on November 29 and will feature two guest speakers: Professor Scott Cunningham from the Department of Humanities & Social Sciences, and SEED Programme Director Mary Galbraith, who will deliver talks on handling complexity in uncertain times, and ideas on managing change, respectively. This second event will be delivered to participants from all eight cohorts.
Our alumni events are a key element of the dedicated alumni club which our graduates can join upon completion of the programme and gives them the opportunity to network across cohorts and build further business relationships, while also further developing those created in their individual cohorts.
The cost of the course is £7,500; however this is 90% subsidised by the UK Government which reduces the fee for participants to just £750 per person.
To find out more, please contact sbs-helptogrow@strath.ac.uk
Dina Al Maimani of our Oman centre received the Al Mar’a Excellence Award 2022 for “Excellence in Educational Services”.
This is an award ceremony hosted by Al Mar'a Magazine (a national Omani magazine) to honour Omani women achievers in various sectors and professions and Dina was honoured for "Excellence in Educational Services" for 2022 .
Dina said, “Words cannot express my happiness & gratitude to all who have supported me in my career in the educational management industry. I would like to express my thanks to Strathclyde Business School and its entire team, in particular the MBA unit - International Division, for their continued support and appreciation.”