Department of Strategy and Marketing

The Department of Strategy and Marketing is a vibrant hub for research and teaching in the key business disciplines of strategic management and marketing. We boast particular research expertise in international strategy and the growing area of strategy-as-practice, which examines what managers actually do as the basis of understanding how to improve performance in marketing and strategy. Another fundamental line of research addresses non-market strategy, the crucial role that managing political and cultural factors plays in organisational success. On the marketing front our members include experts in retail, services, and non-profit marketing, as well as leading researchers in digital marketing and information systems. Much of our research in marketing takes place under the aegis of ISM-Open, The Open University's end of the Institute for Social Marketing, jointly hosted with the University of Stirling. Social marketing harnesses the power of marketing to improve people's health, wealth and welfare, not just their material wellbeing -- and our work contributes to national policy in this field.

Nourished by this research, our teaching draws on The Open University Business School's distinctive practice-based learning approach across a range of relevant and engaging modules at undergraduate and post-graduate levels, including major elements of The Open University's triple-accredited MBA. We also welcome full-time doctoral research students based at our Milton Keynes campus.

Contact details: To contact the Department for Strategy and Marketing, please email Department Secretary, Jan Swallow.

• Business Perspectives: Strategy Masterclass

Professor of Strategy and International Management, Thomas Lawton, was joined by key business leaders and Business School academics in an event that focussed on the process and practice of strategy-making from the perspectives of strategy creators who run their own companies, as well as external consultants and managers who sit at senior and middle-management levels. Together they explored what works for each and where challenges exist, which strategies add most value, which make most sense and, most importantly, which are implementable.

The event featured a complementary but separate evening event hosted by the Dean of the Business School, Professor Rebecca Taylor, who was joined by Evan Davis, BBC editor, presenter and OUBS Visiting Professor, speak to “Do British companies need a more dynamic, strategic approach to prevent them lagging behind in the global economy?” alongside keynote speaker, Alison Copus, Vice President, Marketing, TripAdvisor for Business.

Following on from this event we would like to share some of the valuable output we have produced. This includes:

• A strategy summary report which provides cutting-edge perspectives from around the globe.
• A video recording of the follow-up webinar hosted post-event which includes four highlight videos from the Strategy Masterclass presenting perspectives from Professor Thomas Lawton (OUBS), Antoine Boatwright (Dell), Mike Barnard (Capita plc) and Alison Copus (TripAdvisor).

Teaching

Undergraduate modules

• An introduction to retail management and marketing
• Business organisations and their environments
• Business functions in context
• Making sense of strategy
• Investigating entrepreneurial opportunities
• Marketing and society

Current post-experience and postgraduate modules

• Managing 3: the integration challenge
• Managing 2: marketing and finance
• MBA Stage 1. Management: perspectives and practice
• The dynamics of strategy  

Department members

• Dr Naveed Anwar
  Management & Business Development Fellow
• Dr Haider Ali
  Lecturer in Strategic Marketing
• Dr Roshan Boojihawon
  Lecturer in Strategic Management
• Professor Elizabeth Daniel
  Professor in Information Management
• Professor Sally Dibb
  Professor in Marketing
• Dr Fiona Ellis-Chadwick
  Senior Lecturer in Retail Management
• Professor Thomas Lawton
  Professor of Strategy and International Management
• Dr Fiona Harris
  Lecturer in Management
• Professor Gerard Hastings
  Professor of Social Marketing
• Dr Matthew Hinton
  Senior Lecturer in Information and Knowledge Management
• Dr Andrew Lindridge
  Senior Lecturer in Marketing
• Ms Maureen Meadows
  Senior Lecturer in Management
• Dr Terry O'Sullivan
  Senior Lecturer in Management and Head of the Department for Strategy and Marketing
• Dr Tim Ray
  Senior Lecturer in Knowledge & Innovation
• Dr Helen Roby
  Research Associate
• Emerita Professor Susan Segal-Horn
  Emerita Professor of International Strategy
• Dr Claudia Simoes
  Senior Lecturer in Marketing
• Dr Anne Smith
  Reader in Marketing and Director of the Research Degrees Programme
• Dr Howard Viney
  Senior Lecturer in Strategic Management
• Dr Alex Wright
  Lecturer in Strategic Management

Research students

• Benjamin Diabah
  Research student
• Tamim Elbasha
  Research student
• Guangyu Freear
  Research student
• Frances Gunn
  Research student
• Charles Mbalyohere
  Research student
• Rishikesh Sinha
  Research student
• Miguel Valdez
  Research student
• Anjali Wanigasuriya Arachchige
  Research student
• Catherine da Silveira
  Research student
• Anjali Wanigasuriya Arachchige
  Research student