The Team
Dr Michael Butler
Michael is a Senior Lecturer in Management at Aston Business School, UK. His research interests focus on change management, specifically, adapting promising management practices to enhance performance. His research has won funding from national competitions e.g. the ESRC.
Michael works on the boundary of academia/practice – he is passionate about helping people and organisations to achieve their potential. The TRANSFORMATION Project is creating innovative management tools by working with Catalyst Education (Birmingham Local Education Partnership), Echo Managed Services, NHS Warwickshire, Playgroup (a London advertising agency), Warwickshire Police, Associated British Foods plc, DHL Supply Chain and the Association for Project Management – new project partners include British Sugar and NGOs. His work has won awards and features regularly in international media (eg the BBC). He consults on organization development and is a Non Executive Director of Beyond Engagement. He has published 3 books, over 25 articles (including world top ranked journals), and many reports.
Why not join The TRANSFORMATION Project? (m.j.r.butler@aston.ac.uk)
The product researchers are creating the next generation of innovative management toolsets linked to their own research specialisms for your performance improvement. This will create a suite of toolsets. The existing toolsets will also be continuously improved.
We are always seeking new team members with passion, expertise and experience. Send your CV and relate it to The TRANSFORMATION Project (for example, themes around innovation for impact within change and project management) to the Project Lead, Dr. Michael JR Butler, at m.j.r.butler@aston.ac.uk. However, we are open to any imaginative idea, especially those with funding (more experimental ideas might include links to organisational cognitive neuroscience)
Laurie O’Broin – Research Assistant and Corporate Communications Officer
Laurie is a PhD candidate at Aston University. She completed her MSc in Work Psychology and Business at Aston University. She has a MEng in General Engineering from Durham University. She is accredited as a graduate member of the BPS and is an in-training member of the BPS Division of Occupational Psychology. She worked as a senior business and marketing analyst for Eaton Electrical; a global diversified industrial manufacturing company; for more than 5 years, starting out on a graduate training scheme and has spent time working on various integration-focussed projects within lean engineering, operations, customer service, product management and marketing. Her research interest focuses on organisational development, change management and cross-functional and virtual teams. Currently, her PhD research explores the link between the receptivity for change and business transformation for profitability with a focus on top-level teams. She intends to develop the team-level element of the Receptivity for Change Toolset. She will be working closely with Quintin Heath, a member of our Project Advisory Board. She will also assist with The TRANSFORMATION Project’s corporate communications.
Bander Alrebeay – Research Assistant
Bander completed his MSc in Human Resource Management and Business at Aston University. He has a BSc in Business Administration from King Abdul-Aziz University (Saudi Arabia). He is accredited as graduate membership of the CIPD. He is a member of number of professional bodies such as SHRM and ASTD. He works as an assistant teacher for business management at Umm-Alqura University. Before that, he had worked as an administrative director in one of medical schools for more than 6 years. He was consulted in many HR aspects by public and private as well as non-for-profit organisations. His research interest focuses on HRM practices, performance management and organisational development and change. Currently, his PhD research explores the link between the receptivity for change and innovation. He intends to develop the innovation element of the Receptivity for Change Toolset.
Lidia Gheorghiu – Research Assistant
Lidia is a PhD candidate at Aston Business School, UK. Lidia has a BA in Sociology from Babes-Bolyai University Cluj-Napoca, Romania, including Post Graduate courses in social work, judiciary psychology, and an MSc in Human Rights and Human Values from Birmingham University, UK. Her research interest focuses on policy transfer, discretion at the local level, the improvement of the health and education for the Roma population. She co-wrote with M. Butler in 2010 the articles ‘Exploring the Failure to Protect the Rights of the Roma Child in Romania’ published in Public Administration and Development and ‘Evaluating the Skills Strategy through a Graduate Certificate in Management – An Experiential Learning Theory Approach’ in Education and Training.
We have a network of experienced and expert Knowledge Exchange Executives drawn from a range of sectors.
In line with our philosophy of nurturing young talent, we use MSc and MBA students as researchers for your shorter assignments. They use the findings from the assignments to write their projects and dissertations. In return, you receive a dedicated resource with access to Aston Business School faculty associated with The TRANSFORMATION Project.
Quintin Heath
Quintin is the HR Director for the AB Sugar, he has worked in the retail, business to business and consumer goods industries, as well as the public sector. He has been a programme/ project manager, as well as having responsibility for the HR workstream of projects both in the UK and internationally. His interest is in creating tools to increase the effectiveness of project teams and their interaction with stakeholders.
Nick Hodgetts
Nick has a varied work background, having worked at the Home Office, Post Office, HSBC Bank, NHS Direct and Warwickshire Police before joining NHS Warwickshire in May 2010, moving to the amalgamated NHS Arden Cluster in June 2011. His professional background is in Project and Programme Management, originally in IT but spreading to wider business and public sector practice. He has developed a more flexible approach to project and programme management based on “everything we need to do and nothing else”, which has proved very successful in organisations where it was far too easy to become swallowed up in the process at the expense of actually delivering benefits.
A project manager for 10 years, a Programme Manager for 3 years and a Head of Programme Management for (so far) 5 years, he holds an MBA in Leadership (Distinction) and a Diploma in Management. He is keen on travelling and also did a tandem skydive for his 40th birthday.