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Dr Sheila Tyler

Senior Lecturer in Management Development

You can email Dr Sheila Tyler directly; but for media enquiries please contact a member of The Open University's Media Relations team.

Staff profile

See below for Dr Sheila Tyler's:

Biography

Sheila is a senior lecturer in management development and is chair of The Open University Business School Professional Certificate in Management course, the open access route to the MBA, which attracts some 7,000 students annually. A developmental psychologist, she joined The Open University Business School in 1996 as a researcher, funded by The Open University Business School and IBM, to study working managers in Europe, the Middle East and Africa studying Open University Business School courses. She was instrumental in versioning courses for online delivery and recently led a new problem-based approach to assessment, one of a number of innovations in the design, production and presentation of teaching material. The work on assessment led to an Open University Teaching Award for her and her team. In chairing the Professional Certificate in Management course, she works with international partner institutions in Russian and Romania; this work involves practice sharing and co-production of learning material.

Her teaching-related publications include The Manager's Good Study Guide (Open University Worldwide), an accessible book on studying and learning.

As a developmental psychologist, she has a particular interest in how managers learn to manage (involves thinking skills and behaviour change as well as acquiring professional knowledge). Her research focuses on these aspects of teaching/learning development and the design of techniques and instruments to measure knowledge application in the workplace and organisational capacity to leverage new learning (the relationship between individuals and systems). She led the development of an automated survey system, ACES, which spawned other electronic systems for staff and courses surveying. This research, which may be regarded primarily as R&D, feeds directly into teaching, practices and systems through internal reports and through services designed to attract and retain corporate sponsors of students.

Other research work has involved a Return on Investment project for EFMD (European Foundation for Management Development) and membership of research project teams, e.g. the Education for Development Policy and Management project, a comparative study involving several partners in Africa, designed to ascertain the impact of management education in workplaces, in different cultures and contexts. It was funded by the Department for International Development.

 

Teaching interests

I am a course team member of B823 (Managing Knowledge, an MBA course) and B630 (Certificate in Management). Course team chair of B551 (The Manager's Good Study Guide). I also work at programme level on assessment and course design.

Research interests

My research interest is in learning, approaches to and application of learning, management learning/development and its measurement-in-context. This means that the capacity of employer organizations to facilitate the application of new knowledge by adult management learners features strongly in my work. I am a member of the strategy group for ELSA (Electronic Surveys Alliance) technical infrastructure supporting applications for automated evaluation/feedback systems including ACES (Automated Corporate Evaluation Service) which provides an organizational capacity-building tool for corporate customers by measuring application of learning in the workplace relating this to organizational support systems. I am the lead academic for ACES and am involved in a number of associated evaluation projects designed to create new instruments.

Areas of expertise

  • management learning design

Publications

Journal papers
Murphy, SM, Tyler, S  (2005)  'The relationship between learning approaches to part-study of management courses, and transfer of learning to the workplace', Educational Psychology, vol. 25, issue 5, pp. 455-469. Abstract
Books
Tyler, Sheila (ed)  (2007)  'The Manager's Good Study Guide (3rd ed.)', Milton Keynes, Open University Worldwide. Abstract
Tyler, S  (2007)  'The Manager's Good Study Guide, 3rd edition', Open University Worldwide.
Tyler, Sheila (ed)  (2003)  'The Managers Good Study Guide: an essential reference with key concepts, tools and techniques explained', Open University.
Book chapters
Tyler, S, Entwistle, NJ  (2007)  'Approaches to learning and studying inventory: self-score version (3rd edition)', The Managers Good Study Guide: an esential reference with key concepts, tools and techniques explained, Milton Keynes, U.K., Open University Worldwide Ltd, pp. 339-352. Abstract
Winship, JH  (2007)  'Glossary of financial terms', The Manager's Good Study Guide, 3rd edition, Milton Keynes, Open University Worldwide, pp. 266-275. Abstract
Tyler, S  (2004)  'Making leadership and management development measure up', Leadership in Organizations: current issues and key trends, London, U.K., Routledge, pp. 152-170. Abstract
Tyler, S, Entwistle, NJ  (2003)  'Approaches to learning and studying inventory: self-score version', Tyler, S (ed.) The Managers Good Study Guide: An Essential Reference with Key Concepts, Tools and Techniques Explained, Open University.
Tyler, S, Green, MJ, Simpson, CA  (2001)  'Experimenting in Lotus Learning Space', Innovation in Open and Distance Learning: sucessful development of online and web-based learning, London, U.K., Kogan Page Limited, pp. 63-76. Abstract
Conference papers
Ramanau, R, Tyler, S  (2011)  'International management learning: comparative study of the Open University students', Proceedings of the European Humanities University Conference: Social Sciences, Humanities and Higher Education in Eastern Europe after 1991, Vilnius, Lithuania, Vilnius, Lithuania. Abstract
Ramanau, R, Tyler, S  (2011)  'International management learning: comparative study of The Open University students', The Higher Education Academy Business Management Accountancy and Finance Network Conference 2011, Bournemouth, UK, The Higher Education Academy Annual BMAF (Business, Management, Accountancy and Finance) Network. Abstract
Murphy, SM, Tyler, S  (2000)  'How do students prepare for part-time study?', European Learning Styles Inventory Network Conference, Hertfordshire, U.K.. Abstract
Tyler, S, Stenham, R  (1999)  'Redefining ourselves', ALT-C, Bristol.
Tyler, S, Stenham, R  (1999)  'Technology and learning - revisiting the past', ALT-C The Learning Technology Life-Cycle : Design, Practice and Outcomes, Bristol. Abstract
Tyler, S, Stenham, R  (1999)  'Technology and learning - revisiting the past', ALT-C The Learning Technology Life-Cycle : Design, Practice and Outcomes, Bristol. Abstract
Lewis, JM, Tyler, S  (1999)  'Why managers choose a strategic approach to learning', British Academy of Management Annual Conference, Manchester, U.K..
Tyler, S  (1991)  'Adopting a viewpoint: drawing and domain specificity', Centre for Human Development and Learning, The Open University.
Tyler, S, Light, P  (1991)  'Children’s drawings from a problem-solving perspective', International Conference on Developmental Psychology, Seville, pp. 224.
Tyler, S  (1990)  'Research questions in pictorial development', School of Education, The Open University.
Other
Tyler, S, Gray, CWJ  (2005)  '10 things to consider', issue 10/06/10, Blog for OpenLearn.
Tyler, S  (1991)  'Poster, Demonstration, Video Presentation', The Open University Open Day.