Professor Fiona Denney 

Prior to March 2020, our academic communities were largely campus-based and face-to-face (although admittedly this was evolving in some areas), and thus visible and tangible. One of the biggest challenges that came with the onslaught of Covid, however, was the deconstruction of this previous concept of community and the evolution of something less corporeal and more virtual. As we emerge into a post-pandemic phase, we need to rethink our definitions and expectations of academic communities, especially in the face of new challenges. In this keynote, I explore the experiences of staff and leaders in our universities during the pandemic period and pose some questions and thoughts about how we might redefine academic communities and in particular what this means for the notion of leadership.

 

Professor Fiona Denney is a Professor of Business Education in the Organisations and People division in Brunel Business School at Brunel University London. In a career spanning over 25 years, Fiona has been a business studies academic in the areas of marketing and general management and leadership and she has held a number of central university leadership positions. Between 2003 and 2019, Fiona worked in academic staff and researcher development, including being the Assistant Director of the Graduate School at King’s College London and heading up the Brunel Educational Excellence Centre at Brunel University London until 2019. Both of these positions plus national and international work in researcher development have involved Fiona in strategic leadership and operational management including managing people, projects and resources, which now form her research interests in the areas of leadership, and management in higher education.

 

Fiona also provides consultancy work for Epigeum, a leading developer of online courses for higher education and she is an executive coach for The Iversen Practice, where she specialises in working with women who seek a space to find their true direction, and anyone who needs help in navigating unhealthy power dynamics. Fiona has also designed and facilitated numerous leadership programmes and workshops for those who are seeking to progress in their careers and she has particular interests in researching and supporting the development of compassionate leadership approaches and mentoring women in their career progression.