Prf Jean Hartley

Professional biography

Jean Hartley is Emeritus Professor at the Open Univerity.  She was Professor of Public Leadership at the Open University 2013-2024 and was the founding Academic Director of the OU's Centre for Policing Research and Learning for 10 years.  She led the network of 80 OU academics across all faculties working in partnership with 24 UK police forces to create and use knowledge to improve policing for the public good. 

Jean held earlier academic appointments at Warwick University Business School (1996-2013) where she was Professor of Organizational Analysis.  She held earlier posts at the universities of Manchester, Sheffield, and London (Birkbeck College).  She has a first degree in psychology and a PhD in organizational psychology.  

Jean has held visiting appointments at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government and at the Australia and New Zealand School of Government (ANZSOG) as well as at the University of Giessen Germany. She was a Fellow of the Sunningdale Institute, attached to the then National School of Government which worked to improve the use of management knowledge by the civil service. 

Jean was a member of the National Advisory Group on the Safety of Patients in England, which produced the Berwick Report in 2013 for the Prime Minister following the Mid Staffordshire hospital enquiry.  

In 2011, Jean was a founding trustee of the charity Friends of Ibba Girls School, South Sudan which provides education for over 300 primary and secondary girls.  She is currently Vice Chair. 

Research interests

Jean's research is on public leadership and management, public innovation, organizational and cultural change, knowledge sharing between organizations, and public value. She has a particular interest in leadership with political astuteness and has lead research teams to study this across all sectors in the UK,  and all public services in the UK, Australia and New Zealand. Her research with the police has focused on leadership to tackle rural crime and in multi-agency collaboration, leadership to create public value, and the dynamics of police working with elected politicians. Her research involves working closely with policy-makers and practitioners.  She has won three national or international awards for the quality of her research.  She has written seven books and numerous well-cited publications.  

Teaching interests

Public leadership, leadership with political astuteness, innovation in governance and public services, public value, organizational change, inter-organizational learning. 

External collaborations

Jean is on the editorial board of a number of public management and administration journals.  

International links

Jean is currently collaborating with Eckhard Schroeter of the German University of the Police, and Kathy Quick of the University of Minnesota on a book about policing and public management. They are also collaborating, along with Nick Caveney of Hertfordshire Constabulary on a special issue of the journal Public Money and Management about policing and public management.  Jean, Eckhard, Kathy and the OU's Paul Walley convene the policing and public management panel of the newly-formed European Network on Public Management.  Jean also collaborates on public innovation studies with Rolf Ronning of Norway Inland University, Lars Fuglsang of the University of Roskilde, Denmark, and Karin Geuijen of Utrecht University Netherlands.