About
I joined the University of Liverpool Management School (ULMS) in 2008 as Professor of Entrepreneurship. I was Head of the Organization and Management group from 2011 to 2014. Currently I am responsible for the Centre for Enterprise and Entrepreneurial Leadership (CEEL), which provides support for entrepreneurs and owner-managers in Greater Merseyside. CEEL staff delivered the LEAD (Leadership Enterprise and Development) programme to over 100 small firms in 2009 and 2010. The LEAD programme formed the basis of an Impact Case which was submitted to the 2014 REF. Currently, we are offering a programme known as Growth Catalyst to Liverpool-based small firms. Previously I was Professor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation at Manchester Metropolitan University Business School (MMUBS). While at MMUBS I was responsible for establishing the Centre for Enterprise and the associated incubator, Innospace. I have also worked at Aston Business School, University of Leicester School of Management and UMIST School of Management (ESRC Teaching Fellow). I obtained a BA (Hons) in Organization Studies at Lancaster University and completed my PhD at Manchester Business School. Before embarking on an academic career I served an apprenticeship with British Aerospace (Broughton) and spent 12 years working as an industrial engineer at Hotpoint (North Wales).
I was co-editor of the International Journal of Management Reviews from 2010 to 2016 and previously I was editor of the International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behaviour and Research (IJEBR) from 2005 to 2010. My early publications were focused on the management of innovation in the pharmaceutical industry – the subject of my PhD – with publications in Human Relations and the British Journal of Management. Subsequently, I have concentrated on entrepreneurship and the management of smaller firms Much of my output has examined the nature of learning in smaller organizations and this material have appeared in a wide-range of journals including Business History, Entrepreneurship & Regional Development, International Small Business Journal, Long Range Planning, Management Learning, R&D Management and Technovation. My more recent publications have focused on the resourcing of entrepreneurial firms particularly via bootstrapping. Co-authors for much of this work are my ULMS colleagues Dilani Jayawarna and Allan Macpherson with whom I recently published a textbook: Resourcing the Start-up Business: Creating Dynamic Entrepreneurial Learning Capabilities (Routledge).