Principal investigator
Dr. Ruth Yeoman
Ruth leads the ‘Making Meaningful Cities’ programme at Northumbria and Oxford.
Ruth’s academic research focusses on meaningfulness and mutuality in work, organisations and systems. She has published two monographs, Ethics, Meaningfulness, and Mutuality for Routledge Studies in Business Ethics (2020), and Meaningful Work and Workplace Democracy: a philosophy of work and a politics of meaningfulness for Palgrave Macmillan (2014). She is lead editor of the Oxford Handbook of Meaningful Work (2019), and co-editor of the JMS special issue on Meaningful Work (2019). With Professor Carl Rhodes (University of Technology, Sydney) and Professor Jean-Philippe Deranty (Macquarie University, Sydney), Ruth is co-editing a Special Issue for Organization entitled ‘Does Work Have a Future?’
Ruth worked with Hermes Retail Estate to develop the concept of the Meaningful City, and co-wrote the 2020 JPI Urban Europe Policy Paper on Dilemmas of Public Spaces. In 2021, Ruth was a visiting Senior Fellow at the Humanities and Social Change Centre, The Humboldt University, Berlin, and responded to Professor Alex Honneth’s Benjamin Lectures on the Crisis of Labour. Currently, Ruth is a member of the European Network on Workplace Democracy, Centre Marc Bloch, Berlin; and the Meaning and Purpose Network (MaPNet), King’s College.
Ruth has degrees from Imperial College (BSc. Physics), London Business School (MBA), and Royal Holloway, University of London (MA in Politics of Democracy, PhD in Meaningful Work and Workplace Democracy).
Relevant Publications
Yeoman, R. & Mueller Santos, M. (2020, forthcoming). Citizen Capabilities for Developing the Meaningful City. In: Stenvall, Leitenen, Yeoman, Thompson & Mueller Santos (eds.). Beyond Public Value: a new agenda for future cities. Palgrave Macmillan.
Yeoman, R. (2019). The Meaningful City. In: Yeoman, Bailey, Madden and Thompson (eds.). Oxford Handbook of Meaningful Work. Oxford University Press.
Yeoman, R. (2014). Conceptualising Meaningful Work as a Fundamental Human Need. Journal of Business Ethics, 125 (2), 235-251.
researcher
Dr. Marc Thompson
Marc Thompson is an expert on organisational change and leadership.
He is interested in how alternative models of organising can create opportunities for people to find greater meaning and purpose in their working lives. Different governance models such as employee owned businesses, mutuals, co-operatives and social enterprises amongst others are real alternatives to traditional private or public sector organisations. In more traditional organisations, innovative modes of organising and working can significantly alter employee’s levels of engagement and generate more meaningful work. His research is interested in how both modes of reform can create more democratic, collaborative and sustainable work which can meet economic and social needs.
A related interest is in City Leadership and how this can be designed to enable the emergence of more meaningful cities. He was a co-researcher on the Meaningful Cities project.
Relevant Publications
Thompson, M, (2022) City Leadership. In Stenwall, J et al. Public Values for Cities and City Policy. Palgrave MacMillan
Bailey, C., Lips‐Wiersma, M., Madden, A., Yeoman, R., Thompson, M., & Chalofsky, N. (2019). The five paradoxes of meaningful work: Introduction to the special issue ‘meaningful work: Prospects for the 21st century’. Journal of Management Studies, 56(3), 481-499.
Yeoman, R., Bailey, C., Madden, A., & Thompson, M. (Eds.). (2019). The Oxford Handbook of Meaningful Work. Oxford University Press.
researcher
Dr. Milena Mueller Santos
Milena Mueller Santos completed her DPhil in Management Studies at Oxford University. Her research interests include the interface of meaningfulness, sustainability, supply chains, shared value creation and corporate reputation.
Relevant Publications
Yeoman, Ruth, and Milena Mueller Santos (2019). “A complex systems model for transformative supply chains in emerging markets.” International Journal of Emerging Markets.
Yeoman, Ruth, and Milena Mueller Santos (2019). “Global value chains, reputation, and social cooperation.” Global Aspects of Reputation and Strategic Management. Emerald Publishing Limited. •
Harvey, William S., Timothy Morris, and Milena Mueller Santos (2017). Reputation and identity conflict in management consulting. Human Relations 70, (1) 92-118.