PhD Projects

 

At present, I have a number of projects that are suitable for people who want to study for their Ph.D.s in fit-related, recruitment and selection or management education subjects at Coventry University. If you want a PhD, but don't want the hassle of identifying the subject, these projects might be just right for you. They are:

 

Fit and Misfit

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Fit is my main area of interest. It is the field of my own PhD and many of my publications. I am interested in the 'big' issues of fit. Is fit a good thing or a bad thing for organisations? Is it possible to change the fit of employees? Is it possible to select people because of their fit? What are the ethical issues associated with fit? These big questions are explored in many of the following PhD questions. Increasingly, I find myself drawn to misfit. As I think about the conditions of fit and misfit, I find myself thinking about wellness and illness. Fit represents wellness, misfit represents illness. Taking this approach, whilst the study of wellness is interesting, the study of misfit is important because it may help us alleviate a state of suffering.

Fit

  • Testing the ASA cycle in expatriate assignments
  • Is it possible to select people to influence levels of fit?
  • Does home-working erode person-organisation fit?
  • How do managers assess the fit of their staff?
  • Exploring the implications of managers' perceptions of employees' fit
  • Perceived and projected fit: Two sides of the same coin?
  • Emotions, positive psychology and the emergence of fit
  • How do job applicants define fit when they say they are looking for an employer where they will 'fit in'?
  • How do organisational selectors define fit when they say they are looking for someone who will 'fit in'?
  • The formation of fit during the early stages of employment

  

Misfit

  • Do people leave organisations when they become a misfit?
  • How does the economic downturn influence the experience of misfits?
  • Taking a diathesis-stress approach, what predisposes people to misfit and what are the triggers?
  • Is misfit a psychopathology?
  • Fit and misfit: Emotions or cognitions?

 

Recruitment and Selection

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My recruitment and selection interests lie largely outside the current literature. Many of these questions have emerged after my own qualitative study of recruitment and selection (see Experiencing Recruitment and Selection) highlighted that the concerns of applicants and selectors were very different to the issues in the literature.

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  • How do mixed applicant pools influence recruitment and selection?
  • Why do interviews dominate personnel selection?
  • What is the impact of market forces on personnel selection decisions?
  • References: Are they worth the paper they are written on?
  • The impact of reality recruitment on real recruitment and selection

 

Management Education

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My interests in the field of management education fall into two categories: (1) new and innovative ways of teaching and (2) the role business schools and their purpose.

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  • Are feature films a useful learning device in the management classroom?
  • The impact of visual media in the management classroom
  • Could undergraduate business education be modelled on medical education?
  • The impact of management education on business

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Finding Out More 

You can study for either a part-time or a full-time Ph.D. at Coventry University.

If you want to find out more, please feel free to contact me on +44 (0) 2476 888412 to discuss the opportunities, or email me at j.billsberry@coventry.ac.uk.

Alternatively, you can find out more about Ph.D.s at the Coventry University at http://wwwp.coventry.ac.uk/researchnet/degrees or you can email the research office at research-apps.pg@coventry.ac.uk.