Advancing Canada's Competitive Advantage – A national forum on management

Friday October 2nd

Business Schools and Management Research: Evaluation, Impact and Future Evolution

Ongoing debate about research in business schools suggest tensions between the research goals of rigour and relevance. This has led to a perceived problematic gap in the relationship between theory and practice in management research. This controversy is examined and it is pointed out that research impacts must be judged not only in terms of theoretical development but also managerial and policy impact. Such impact is difficult to measure if the goals of ‘practice-engaged’ scholarship are to be achieved. Evidence, drawn from UK and North American experience, is used to draw further insights about issues of research value, impact and strength.

[view slideshow in pdf format]

Biography

Author of over 30 books and over 200 articles on topics in strategic management including Strategy: Analysis and Practice (McGraw-Hill), Howard Thomas is also a Highly-Cited Scholar in his field in the ISI Web of Science listing and serves on the editorial board of several journals including Long Range Planning and the Strategic Management Journal.

Previously Dean of the College of Commerce and Business Administration and James F. Towey Distinguished Professor of Strategic Management at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA 1991-2000. Prior to this he held posts as Foundation Professor of Management at the Australian Graduate School of Management in Sydney, as Director of the Doctoral Programme at London Business School, and visiting and permanent posts at institutions such as the European Institute of Advanced Studies of Management in Brussels, the University of Southern California, the University of British Columbia, the Sloan School of Management, MIT, and Kellogg School, Northwestern University. Past President of the US Strategic Management Society, past Chair of the Board of the Graduate Management Admissions Council (GMAC), member of Beta Gamma Sigma Honorary Society, and Fellow of both the Academy of Management in the US and the British Academy of Management in the UK; Fellow of the Strategic Management Society US (and current Dean of Fellows) and the Sunningdale Institute of the Cabinet Office, UK, Honorary Life Member and former Vice-President of EFMD (European Foundation for Management Development). He also serves as a board member of Global Foundation for Management Education GFME (Chair), and State Farm Bank, US. He is a companion of ABS and Chair of the Association of Business Schools (ABS), UK, 2008-2010, and Vice Chair, Chair of AACSB (Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business) International, 2008-2010. He was awarded an Honorary Degree (fellowship) by Swansea University, Wales, UK in 2008.

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Mr David Wicks, Dean and Associate Professor at Sobey School of Business, Saint Mary’s University will be moderator.

The conference will take place in the Amphitheatre IBM at HEC Montréal, at 8 am.