Gender and Diversity Research Cluster

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About us

About us

The Gender & Diversity Research Cluster is a well-established group providing a supportive and inclusive environment to produce critical business and management research, develop teaching practice, and generate stakeholder engagement activities, focusing on gender and its intersection with different aspects of diversity in the workplace. Its interdisciplinary membership includes qualitative and quantitative researchers from the Department of Strategy, Leadership & Operations (SLO), the Centre for Enterprise, Environment and Economic Development Research (CEEDR), Law, Economics, Mental Health & Social Work, Criminology & Sociology, Psychology, Transdisciplinary Practice and Natural Sciences.

Our goal is to nurture a community of practice that engages with internal and external stakeholders to contribute to equity in workplaces, as well as the development of fairer, healthier, more prosperous and sustainable societies more broadly.

Cluster lead Bianca Stumbitz led on a REF 2021 impact case study on Maternity Protection which built on cluster members’ long-standing cross-national research on work and family. Our ethos and activities closely align with the University strategy and support preparation for the next REF submission. 

Our research

Our research

Current research builds on a body of work with strong societal impact presented in our REF 2021 impact case study on Maternity Protection.

  • Transition to Parenthood in UK SMEs (2022-2025) (website currently under construction)
    Funder: ESRC (Transforming Working Lives). (£592,900)
    Cluster members involved: B. Stumbitz (PI); A. Burnett; B. Chabe-Ferret; C. Santos; E. Rascon-Ramirez; S. Lewis; T. Freeman
  • Transition to Parenthood in SMEs : Developing the Impact of an Awareness Raising Toolkit for Employers and Employees (2024-2025)
    Funder: HEIF (£5,000)
    Cluster members involved: B. Stumbitz (PI); A. Burnett; B. Chabe-Ferret; C. Santos; E. Rascon-Ramirez; S. Lewis; T. Freeman
  • Migrants in Transit: A transdisciplinary writing programme for emerging scholars of migration in Tunisia (2023-2025)
    Funder: British Academy (£35,460)
    Cluster members involved: T. Freeman
  • Evaluation of Fertility Network UK’s workplace initiative, supporting employers, managers and employees to understand the impact of fertility challenges and treatment (2023-2025)
    Funder: Fertility Network UK through the DHSC’s Health and Wellbeing Fund: women's reproductive wellbeing in the workplace (£16,500)
    Cluster members involved: N. Payne 

  • Evaluation of Fertility Network UK’s reaching communities project (2023-2024) 
    Funder: Fertility Network UK through the National Lottery (£5,000)
    Cluster members involved: N.Payne
  • Awareness of Menopause Symptoms and Workplace Support (2023-2024)
    Funder: RFF (£990)
    Cluster members involved: B. Stumbitz; B. Stordal
  • EDI, Employee Voice and Wellbeing in Remote Working (2023-2024)
    Funder: HEIF (£2,470)
    Cluster members involved: C. Santos
  • Supporting the Reproductive Health Needs of Women Migrant Workers in the service and hospitality industries, women migrant domestic workers and women Rohingya refugees in Malaysia (2023). 
    Funder: UK Research and Innovation Additional QR and Additional RCIF Grant Allocations 2022-2023
    Cluster members involved: T. Freeman
  • LGBTQ+ women, trans and non-binary experiences of dating apps (2022-2023)
    Funder: HEIF (£4,970)
    Cluster members involved: L. Overton
  • Supporting and Developing Knowledge Exchange for Inclusive Innovation in Communities (2022-2023)
    Funder: HEIF (4,750)
    Cluster members involved: C. Santos; B. Stumbitz
  • Evaluation of a community childhood obesity management service pilot (2022-2023)
    Funder: London Borough of Barking and Dagenham via the DHSC and PHE’s Child and Family Weight Management Services Grant (£27,738)
    Cluster members involved: N. Payne 
  • Survey on the impacts of fertility challenges and treatment on work and mental health (2022)
    Funder: Fertility Network UK (£5,500)
    Cluster members involved: N. Payne
Our staff

Our staff

Bianca Stumbitz (CEEDR)

Cluster staff from Middlesex work closely with Associates drawn from a wide range of other academic institutions.

  • Sabrina Akbar (SLO)
  • Amy Burnett (CEEDR)
  • Bastien Chabé-Ferret (Economics)
  • Anastasia Christou (Criminology & Sociology)
  • Tim Freeman (SLO)
  • Julie Haddock-Millar (SLO)
  • Susan Hansen (Psychology)
  • Erica Howard (Law)
  • Shilan Fuad Hussain (Postdoctoral Fellow, Law)
  • Eleonore Kofman (Law)
  • Roger Kline (SLO)
  • Orthodoxia Kyriacou (Transdisciplinary Practice)
  • Suzan Lewis (Emerita Professor, SLO)
  • Lisa Overton (Law)
  • Alex Patrick (Law)
  • Nicola Payne (Psychology)
  • Alfonso Pezzella (Mental Health & Social Work)
  • Neelam Raina (Director of Research)
  • Ericka Rascon-Ramirez (Economics)
  • Rima Saini (Criminology & Sociology)
  • Clarice Santos (SLO)
  • Britta Stordal (Natural Sciences)
  • Bianca Stumbitz (CEEDR) 

  • Maria Adamson (Queen Mary University of London)
  • Alexandra Beauregard (Birkbeck, University of London)
  • Uracha Chatrakul Na Ayudhya (Birkbeck, University of London)
  • Anne Daguerre (University of Brighton)
  • Anne-Wil Harzing (CYGNA)
  • Salman Khan (Kings College London)
  • Daniela Lup (ESCP Business School, London)
  • Lilian Miles (University of Westminster)
  • Ian Roper (University of Essex)
  • Michela Vecchi (Kingston University)
  • Marianna Kornilaki
Postgraduate research

Postgraduate research

We welcome doctoral candidates in the area of gender and its intersection with different aspects of diversity in the workplace.

Many Cluster members are PhD and DProf supervisors who work together to develop research approaches suited to contemporary problems and, particularly in case of the DProf, solutions to practitioners’ issues. Our Cluster already includes PhD/DProf student and PostDoc members and we are keen to build future student/graduate membership to increase our mentoring and research capacity building activities.

Outputs

Selected recent public outputs

  • Beham, B., Ollier-Malaterre, … A., Lewis, S., Beauregard, T., et al. (2023). Humane orientation, work–family conflict, and positive spillover across cultures. Journal of Applied Psychology, https://dx.doi.org/10.1037/apl0001093; output from previous cluster funding.
  • Borg, A., den Dulk, L., Lewis, S., & Santos, C. (2020). Community, work and family in diverse contexts and changing times. Community, Work & Family, 23(5), 497-502. https://doi.org/10.1080/13668803.2020.1832264. 
  • Ciuk, S., Śliwa, M., & Harzing, A. W. (2023). Implementing the equality, diversity, and inclusion agenda in multinational companies: A framework for the management of (linguistic) diversity. Human Resource Management Journal, 33(4), 868-888. https://doi.org/10.1111/1748-8583.12487.
  • Freeman, T., Miles, L. and Ying, K. 2024. Self-surveillance practices of factory women migrant workers receiving SRH interventions in Malaysia: The effects of salience, gendered subjectivity and universalism. Economic and Industrial Democracy. https://doi.org/10.1177/0143831X231225098.
  • Freeman, T., Miles, L., Ying, K., Mat Yasin, S. and Lai, W. 2021. At the limits of "capability": The sexual and reproductive health of women migrant workers in Malaysia. Sociology of Health & Illness. 45 (5), pp. 947-970. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9566.13323.
  • Jaga, A., Stumbitz, B., Mabaso, B.P., Munyai, K. and Görgens, T., 2024. Advancing gender equality through context-sensitive work-family support for breastfeeding: lessons from a participatory intervention in South Africa. Community, Work & Family, pp.1-21. https://doi.org/10.1080/13668803.2024.2405513.
  • Kline, R., 2023. Paradigm lost? Reflections on the effectiveness of NHS approaches to improving employment relations. BMJ leader, 7(4). https://doi.org/10.1136/leader-2022-000729.
  • Miles, L., Freeman, T., Wan Teng, L., Mat-Yasin, S. and Ying, K. 2022. Empowerment as a pre-requisite to managing and influencing health in the workplace: the sexual and reproductive health needs of factory women migrant workers in Malaysia. Economic and Industrial Democracy. 43 (4), pp. 1676-1698. https://doi.org/10.1177/0143831x211024725
  • Payne, N., Seenan, S. and van den Akker, O., 2019. Experiences and psychological distress of fertility treatment and employment. Journal of Psychosomatic Obstetrics & Gynecology, 40(2), pp.156-165. https://doi.org/10.1080/0167482X.2018.1460351.
  • Stumbitz, B. and Jaga, A., 2020. A southern encounter: Maternal body work and low‐income mothers in South Africa. Gender, Work & Organization, 27(6), pp.1485-1500. https://doi.org/10.1111/gwao.12527.

  • Christou, A. and Kofman, E. (2022). Gender and migration: IMISCOE short reader. IMISCOE Research Series. Springer, Cham, Switzerland.
  • Jaga, A., Stumbitz, B. and Lambert, S., 2024. Work-family entanglement: drawing lessons from the complex lives of low-income women. In Making and Breaking Gender Inequalities in Work (pp. 33-53). Edward Elgar Publishing.
  • Santos, C. & Freitas, V. (2023). Leadership for the future: Co-creation in communities. In S.K. Dhiman (Ed.), The Routledge Companion to Leadership and Change.
  • Santos, C. & Freitas, V. (2022). The Americanization of Brazilian business and management curriculum. In D. Lock, A. Caputo, D. Hack-Polay & P. Igwe (Eds.), Borderlands: The Internationalisation of Higher Education Teaching Practices.
  • Stumbitz, B., 2020. Maternity protection at work: decent work for all during pregnancy and new motherhood. In Decent work and economic growth (pp. 695-705). Cham: Springer International Publishing.

Events/Media

Events/Media

  • 9th International Community, Work & Family Conference,  June 2023, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (see conference website), organized by our Cluster.
    The conference involved collaboration with three university partners in Brazil and attracted delegates from more than 20 countries. It included presentations on current Cluster research on workplace support for new parents, workplace menopause support, as well as on how to design an impactful research project. A CWF conference special issue will be published in the journal Community, Work & Family in 2025.
  • 8-year anniversary of CYGNA, May 2022, co-hosted by the Cluster and ESCP Business School, London.
    Presentation by Bianca Stumbitz and Clarice Santos on researcher positionality and academic activism, using examples from their research (see related blogpost)
  • Report launch: Future-Proofing Your Flexible Workforce: Lockdown Lessons from Managers who are Parents, March 2023, Queen Mary University of London.
    Sue Lewis (Middlesex University) and Cluster associates Maria Adamson (Queen Mary University of London) and Alexandra Beauregard (Birkbeck, University of London) in partnership with Working Families
  • ‘How to prepare a large-scale funding application (see related blogpost), December 2022, Dialogue session (online) co-hosted by our Cluster and the SLO department.
    Presentation by Bianca Stumbitz, using the ‘Transition to Parenthood in UK SMEs’ funding application as an example.
Get in touch

Get in touch

Email Bianca Stumbitz on [email protected].

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