My research interests include: regional economic development; economic geographies of weaker, post-industrial and peripheral regions; the roles of universities in regional development; gender perspectives within economic geography.

I am currently working on a three-year project funded by the research agency FORMAS studying innovation policy in the far northern peripheries of Sweden and Scotland. This project aims to explore the barriers and opportunities to enhance sustainable and inclusive economic development through innovation in peripheral areas, and also to enhance our understanding of such regions within economic geography.

I am handling editor of the early career section of the journal Regional Studies, Regional Science and co-ordinator of the research network on gender and regional studies, funded by the Regional Studies Association.

Julia is Co-Head of the Sylvia Pankhurst Gender Research Centre in Manchester Metropolitan University’s Faculty of Business and Law. In 2018/19 she led the establishment of a wider group - the Decent Work and Productivity Research Centre - and 'The Sylvia' now thrives as one of its knowledge platforms.

Equality and mobility are Julia's central concerns and she enjoys fostering research on a range of related issues:

- As a Professor of Entrepreneurship, Julia is well known as a researcher of low paid self-employment and women's enterprise. Given the current boom in self-employment (and debates relating to the 'gig economy') Julia is concerned to define and help policy makers promote 'decent self-employment'. Currently, she's writing about the maternity experiences of the self-employed and - with doctoral students - how welfare systems and micro-enterprise programmes can shape 'decent self-employment'. Julia is campaigning for change to maternity, paternity, adoption and shared parental leave policies for the self-employed.

- Julia also has expertise in workplace maternity management, particularly in small firms. She has contributed to work for the International Labour Organization on this and is supported by the Equality and Human Rights Commission. Her interest in small enterprise is, in fact, broad. With Professor John Kitching at Kingston University she is writing and publishing about a critical realist conception of entrepreneurship. With Dr Paula Turner, she is writing about capability to procure for public sector tenders in small firms.

- With a lively group of colleagues, Julia has formed the Generating Routes for Women's Leadership (GROWL) project. This summarises evidence on barriers that block women's progression into six 'Enquiry Tools' to help organisations to diagnose the cause of their gender pay gap and wider gender inequalities. It works with them, via a network and ideas bank, to develop change. Julia is currently supporting transformational mentoring programmes for women, BAME leaders and female students and writing a review of evidence on women's mentoring programmes to support businesses and researchers.

- Working with Visiting Professor Dr Helen Pankhurst, and colleagues in the Sylvia Pankhurst Gender and Diversity Research Centre, Julia is engaged in promoting awareness of suffrage history in Greater Manchester via our Vote100 celebrations and the GM4women2028 group leading the working group on employment.

- Julia is passionate about research that makes a difference and is developing, with Helen Woolnough, an Engaged-Activist Scholarship methodology.

Julia is committed to developing the international women's enterprise research community, as founder and Vice-Chair of the Gender and Enterprise Network (GEN), an international community of more than 800 international stakeholders interested in advancing and employing scholarship on women's enterprise and the gendering of small enterprise.

I am a Professor of Organisational Studies at the University of Portsmouth. I also lead Portsmouth Business School’s submission to the Research Excellence Framework. My research focus is on public administration and management. Within this, my specific interests are in public governance and gender representation.

My work has been published in highly-respected journals, including the publication of my paper on women in public-private-voluntary sector ‘partnerships’ in Public Administration. I've also edited the book: The International Handbook on Public Administration and Governance by Edward Elgar and authored the book: Making and Managing Public Policy by Routledge.

In 2015, I was made a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences for my contribution to the study of gender equality. Then, in 2018, the American Society for Public Administration awarded me the prestigious Julia J. Henderson award for my outstanding contribution to public administration scholarship.

Biography

In 2002 I received my PhD from the University of Cape Town on the impact of public sector reforms on leadership within the civil service. This followed my degrees in social sciences and public administration from the University of Cape Town, the University of the Western Cape (South Africa) and Ohio State University (USA).

I have worked for leading universities in South Africa, the USA and the UK, holding positions as a professor and as an Associate Dean for Research.

During my career in academia, I've published books, chapters and journal articles on the topic of public management and gender equality. I've acted as editor of the Journal of Public Policy and Administration and continue to serve on boards for journals such as the Public Administration Review.

Alongside my career in academia, I've worked for the Ohio Department of Development in the US, The South African Public Service Commission, the Westminster Foundation for Democracy in the UK and the European Commission.

I'm actively engaged in academic and practitioner networks and have been an executive member of the International Research Society for Public Management and the European Group for Public Administration. I am the only academic in the field to have held both prestigious positions.

Research Interests

My research interests include:

• gender representation

• discourses in public organisations

I'm interested in improving the understanding of barriers and enablers to female representation, progression and influence on the gender equality policy agenda and public debate.

Two journal articles that reflect my research interests are:

• Women in public policy and public administration – Public Money & Management

• Representative bureaucracy, gender, and policing – Public Administration

Zoe is a Senior Lecturer in Entrepreneurship and Enterprise and Entrepreneurship within the Subject Group Strategy, Enterprise and Innovation at the University of Portsmouth. She is Associate Dean (Students) in the Faculty of Business and Law and has been since 2014. Zoe has been instrumental in the growth of entrepreneurship and enterprise education across the faculty and leading the university to Small Business Charter recognition in 2015 and embedding entrepreneurship in the Faculty's mission.

Her current research and knowledge exchange interests relate to capacity building within entrepreneurial ecosystems particularly for students, women, entrepreneurs, microbusinesses, SMEs and the intersection of equality, diversity and inclusion to enhance value outcomes for collaborations. Zoe takes action approaches to research and favours co-creation to enhance impacts.

Zoe is PI at the University of Portsmouth for the Accelerating Women's Enterprise funded by the European Development Fund collaboration between 9 partner institutions from regions bordering the channel and in collaboration with native french speakers in the University of Essex. The University of Portsmouth has lead the research aspect to this project examining gender bias in entrepreneurial ecosystems in France and the UK, good practice entrepreneurship education for disadvantaged women entrepreneurs and qualitative monitoring of impacts. The project uses a co-production methodology working closely with the project's external committee of private finance, bankers, council and regional representatives, trainers to more fully reflect their expertise on outcomes. The UoP codeveloped, piloted and delivered learning for mentors and training designed to support women with additional disadvantages to start up and grow their businesses.

Creative Students Creating Business is a UKRI and OfS sponsored project focused on understanding and sharing good practice in knowledge exchange that involves students as key beneficiaries. As PI, Zoe is leading bringing together the faculties of Business & Law and Creative and Cultural Industries researching 100 student/external organisation projects to distill good practice and create a toolkit The project uses the co-production methodology with stakeholder groups to align research and toolkit creation.

Zoe is collaborating with the new Medical School at the University of Portsmouth to create an innovative management and enterprise curriculum to support the GPs of the future.

I graduated with a BA in Geography from University of Leicester in 1984 and a PhD (Leicester) in 1988. After working in Bristol and City University London on the 1970 Birth Cohort Study, I joined the Department of Geography at Portsmouth as a Lecturer in 1993. Between 1999-2016, I was the Departmental Lead for Teaching, Curriculum and Quality Enhancement. My current departmental role is REF Coordinator.

I have been Principle Lecturer since 2006 and currently act as External Examiner for BA Human Geography at Leeds Beckett University and MSc Human Geography by Research at the University of Reading.

Research Interests

Key Interests: Conditions of labouring in the creative economy; Self-employment, portfolio and fractured work; Spaces, places and practice of micro-entrepreneurship; Gender, self-employment and work-life balance; Motherhood, parenting and work.

An economic geographer with interests in work/labour, particularly entrepreneurship and self-employment in the creative industries. I am especially concerned with the intersection of the economic and the social at the level of the working pratices of individuals and households. My most recent published research has investigated the phenomena of small-scale entrepreneurship carried out (and started up) within the context of family life, parenting and work-life balance. This group, sometimes called ‘mumpreneurs’, are typically professional mothers who have made the decision to manage this work-life balance through small business start-ups (Ekinsmyth 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015).

In previous research I have explored the work of freelancers in London's magazine publishing industry examined through the lenses of 'employment risk' and 'project-organisation'.

In new research I am examining the role of place in creative entrepreneurship.

I am the Research Lead for the Strategy Enterprise and Innovation (SEI) subject group in the Faculty of Business and Law. I’m also Professor of Small Business and Enterprise Development and a member of the Regional Studies Association, Institute for Small Business and Entrepreneurship and fellow of the Higher Education Academy.

I have undertaken work for the Federation of Small Businesses, OECD, Welsh Assembly Government, Queensland Government, Victorian Government (Australia), Welsh Development Agency, Cardiff Council, Council of Mortgage Lenders, Associated British Ports, Shaw Trust, Colegau Cymru and Enterprise Educators UK. My research work spans the UK and Australia.

My 2018 work for the Federation of Small Businesses, in conjunction with colleagues at Portsmouth University and Women’s Enterprise Scotland, which highlighted the growing importance of women owned and managed small businesses to the UK, received widespread media coverage.

I have written over 90 refereed journal articles related to small business and enterprise development, and economic development policy more generally, and I have supported doctoral students on topics including the entrepreneurial university, the resource curse and the internal colony paradigms in the Welsh economy context, and the role of University-Business interactions in knowledge systems and effects on growth.

Biography

In the 2000s, I was a visiting Professor at Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane Australia

I was appointed as a Reader at the University of Glamorgan (now University of South Wales (USW)) in 2004, Professor of Economic Development Policy at Glamorgan in 2009, and Professor of Small Business and Enterprise Development at Portsmouth in 2016. I also became Research Lead for SEI at that time, coinciding with a trebling in REFable outputs with 55% of those since 2016 being at ABS3 and ABS4 level.

Research Interests

I am interested in research that has a meaningful and positive impact on people’s lives. My current research is primarily in the arena of small business and enterprise development, in particular the policy-making processes (both by firms and governments) that can improve economic sustainability and resilience.

• The roles of Entrepreneurial Universities

• Conceptualising University Research Impact

• Drivers of small firm performance and their impacts on the resilience of SMEs

Sass Adams is a freelance Social Media Trainer, Mentor and Manager, having registered as self-employed as a result of the pandemic. Trading as Sass Adams Socials, she works with other small business owners throughout Portsmouth on a mission to empower, support and guide in their social media efforts. Sass has experienced first hand the AWE training programme and supports AWE with its social media and promotion activity. The AWE project has supported the growth of the Female Entrepreneurs Network from 250 to 900 members, promotes our courses, workshops and conferences.

I'm a Co-Founder of My Networking Club (MNC ), a multi award winning, business membership club set up to facilitate effortless and effective networking for family led businesses .

There is a national virtual membership and a regional membership (currently all meetings online ). It's a dynamic membership club that facilitates connecting it's members to forge mutually beneficial, business relationships. Members include women (and men!) heading up established companies, freelancers and regional start ups. We're passionate about supporting family led businesses to make an economic contribution to their household income. We support our members to stay visible and therefore viable.

Our business training courses and workshops, in The MNC Hub, up skill our community and gives them access to expertise to build their businesses.

During the Pandemic, both regional and national meetings have been virtual and we're connecting and networking with about 800 attendees a month. We launched and ran a very successful crowdfunding campaign, to support our community and provide support as the nation eases out of Lockdown.