Dr Olga Andrianova

Professional biography

Olga Andrianova is an expert in sustainable working practices, how organisations respond to climate change, and employee involvement in corporate sustainability. She has wide experience in workplace learning, organisational change, and social responsibility, gained through research, policy work, teaching, and industry.

Since 2023, Olga has been a Lecturer in Management at the Open University (OU), where she teaches on the MSc HRM and CMDA courses. She is passionate about helping students understand how management can support positive social and environmental change.

Olga leads the Common Good HRM Research Cluster, part of REEF, which brings together scholars and practitioners interested in human resource management, social justice, and sustainability. Her research looks at how front-line managers and low-level leaders deal with sustainability challenges, focusing on power, resource differences, and employee voices in workplace changes. She is especially interested in how HR systems can support or hinder collective efforts for sustainability and fairness.

Previously, Olga held academic positions at the University of Exeter Business School, including Industrial Impact Fellow Lecturer in Science, Innovation, Technology, and Entrepreneurship (SITE) at the Penryn Campus and Lecturer in Management at the Exeter Campus.

Before joining academia, Olga worked in private sector with international framework (Henkel CEE GmbH in Vienna (Austria), Beiersdorf AG in Hamburg (Germany) and with international organisations such as UNIDO in Vienna (Austria), OSCE Secretariat in Vienna (Austria), UNDP Belarus in Minsk (Belarus). 

Olga completed her PhD in the Department of Public Leadership and Social Enterprise (PulSe) at the Open University, supervised by Dr Anja Schaefer and Dr Owain Smolovic Jones. Olga also holds Masters in Research in Management and Business, Msc in HRM and MBA from the Open University, Degree in International Management form University of Hamburg (Germany). Moreover, Olga has a teaching qualification from the Academy of Education Stanislaw Staszyc (Poland) and a Trainer Certificate in Business from ABELARD Seminar centre (Austria).

Olga is a Senior Fellow of Higher Education Association (SFHEA).

https://orcid.org/0009-0006-5806-1422

Research interests

Olga's research focuses on sustainable work practices and leadership from a Common Good HRM perspective, which emphasises the promotion of collective interests beyond individual or organisational gains. Olga also studies environmental leadership and explore how aspects of power operate within hierarchical settings. She engages with constructivist, interpretative, and practice-based research perspectives, seeking to question epistemological assumptions. These considerations arise at the level of how theory articulates processes such as learning and change within the context of sustainability, with the aim of advancing themes related to HRM, Sustainability, the Common Good. Additionally, Olga has expertise in post-Soviet contexts, exemplified by her publication exploring the legacies societal structures.

Olga is a contributor to the British Academy of Management Specialised Conference on Responsible Leadership, leading the session on ‘Sustainability Education’ and PhD Symposium.

Olga welcomes interest from potential PhD students in her areas of research.

Teaching interests

Olga currently a member of the module team for MSc HRM Dissertation and Workbase learning for CMDA. She also leads the development of the OU’s new undergraduate core modules 

Impact and engagement

Olga is currently working in close collaboration with non-profit organisations in Somerset, and am interested in new ways to co-produce research with policy and practice partners. 

Recent public and practitioner engagement work includes: https://societal-challenges.open.ac.uk/challenges/reducing-the-impacts-of-hazardous-waste-through-interorganisational-innovative-network-/385

Blog on the green gaming on SCiLAB's website:

Gaming for a Greener Future: How Game Design Can Drive Sustainability at Work | The Scholarship Centre for innovation in online Legal and Business education (SCiLAB)