Dr Gemma Lord

Professional biography

I am a Lecturer in Organisational Behaviour in the Department for People and Organisations at the Open University Business School (OUBS). My research explores leadership, care, sustainability, and collective change within and beyond organisational life. I adopt a critical, interdisciplinary approach that brings together organisation studies, sociology, political ecology, and critical public policy. My work aims to engage both scholarly and public audiences, bridging academic insight with community and policy relevance.

Before joining OUBS, I completed a PhD in Business and Management at the University of Manchester and an MA in Politics: Governance and Public Policy. Prior to academia, I worked for nearly a decade in public and voluntary sector roles focused on service design, participation, and engagement - experiences that continue to inform my research and teaching philosophy.

Research interests

My research investigates how organisations and communities navigate care, sustainability, and ethics within complex and contested environments. I explore tensions between value-driven practice and institutional pressures—especially financialisation, algorithmic logics, and market-based policy reforms.

Recent and current projects include:

1. Care and Accountability in Social Care: A policy-engaged project examining how local authorities, providers, and frontline workers navigate care under austerity and competitive tendering.

2. Ethics Displacement and Mission Drift: Critical studies of nonprofits and civic organisations under performance-driven regimes.

3. Agroecological Transitions and Alternative Agriculture: Including a multi-sited ethnographic study on permaculture practice in the UK and Spain (Seedcorn-funded), and forthcoming work on ecological organising and transitions.

4. Leadership, Sustainability and Post-growth: Ongoing work into the social, ecological, and organisational dimensions of leadership beyond growth logics.

5. Public Value and Civil Society: Examining how alternative organising practices foreground care, justice, and ecological interdependence.

Methodologically, I use qualitative and ethnographic approaches and am especially drawn to storytelling, situated knowledge, and reflective inquiry.

PhD Supervision

I welcome PhD proposals related to:

• Care, ethics, and public service reform

• Sustainability, agroecology, and post-growth transitions

• Alternative and civic organising

• Leadership, responsibility, and social change

• Critical approaches to policy, evaluation, and accountability

Teaching interests

I teach across organisational behaviour, critical management, and research methodology. My teaching bridges theory and practice, drawing on interdisciplinary scholarship and experience in public service innovation. I am committed to inclusive, reflective, and critically engaged pedagogies that empower students to connect learning with real-world challenges and social transformation.