Dr John Paul Kawalek
Director of the MBA
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| Room: | C094 Sheffield University Management School Conduit Road, Sheffield S10 1FL |
| Phone: | +44 (0)114 222 3461 |
| Fax: | +44 (0)114 222 3348 |
| Email: | J.Kawalek@shef.ac.uk |
John´s professional background is in IT and Management Consulting. He started his career in the manufacturing sector as a Programmer/ Analyst, Systems Analyst, and then as a Senior Systems Analyst. He then worked as an Business Consultant, working with a huge array of organisations, e.g. large private sector organisations such as IBM, Lotus, Rover Group, Jaeger Group, British Oxygen; also in the public sector working for DFID, & with French government departments, in the US, in large multi-million dollar companies, as well as with smaller and medium sized organisations. John has held Director level positions in a number of organisations.
He has authored over 50 academic papers, and has written two books. The first of these is entitled "The Art of Organisational Problem Solving: how to think about what we are doing in Management" (published by the Edwin Mellen Press), and this has provided the basis of a new set of change management principles and products, known as INSPIRE.
John holds three degrees in different disciplinary areas. His undergraduate degree is in History & Economics, his master´s degree is in Computer Science and his PhD is in Innovation Systems and Management. He is a member of the British Computer Society, and is Chartered as an Information Technology Professional.
Teaching
He now lectures in Systems Theory, Change Management and Management Consultancy at the University of Sheffield, UK.
John supervises a number of doctoral students. All his students undertake Action Research in organizations, and are engaged researching the Innovation Systems approach to contemporary problems and challenges in organizations. As such, John´s PhD students typically undertake abstract and theoretical work, for practical purpose and outcome, e.g. their research results in new approaches or methods that can be used as consulting products.
Recent/Current Projects
INSPIRE is an acronym for "INnovation System for Performance Improvement and RE-organisation". It is a method for organizations to innovate in their processes, to rationalise, optimise and develop performance improvements. It has been used in organizations which are undergoing change (e.g. in merger or outsourcing situations). Its appeal is that it can help organizations improve their performance in a highly controlled manner, underpinned with a set of very precise methods and constructs. Recent work using INSPIRE, has enabled client organisations to become considerably more effective, and at the same time save significant resources, e.g. a recent client organisation claimed savings of "…about a million dollars" within 2 days! This was an example from the Utilities sector, and John is now engaged in developing INSPIRE for use in the Health Sector.
John´s work in Innovation Systems has been used to challenge traditional approaches and methods in Management. In his second book, "Re Thinking Information Systems in Organisations", published by Routledge, John outlines a new approach and a new set of methods for technology driven innovation in organizations. He outlines a radical new Innovation Systems approach to help with the current failure rates in the benefits realisation of Information Systems investments. He is currently writing a text for Executives in organizations, to help them to engage and embrace these new methods.