Universities in a Changing World: HR’s response to the COVID-19 crisis

Alison Johns

Advance HE, UK

Alison has worked in higher education for 25 years and was appointed Chief Executive of Advance HE in autumn 2017. Prior to this, she was the Chief Executive of the Leadership Foundation. Alison has extensive international experience of higher education - including leading the review of teaching and learning for the Australian government. This led to the establishment of the Office for Learning and Teaching to enhance teaching quality across the Australian higher education sector.

Dr Joanna Newman MBE

Association of Commonwealth Universities

Dr Joanna Newman is Chief Executive and Secretary General of the Association of Commonwealth Universities (ACU). Prior to joining the ACU in April 2017, Joanna was Vice-Principal (International) at King’s College London. Her previous positions include Director of the UK Higher Education International Unit (now known as Universities UK International) and Head of Higher Education at the British Library. Joanna remains a Senior Research Fellow in the Department of History at King’s College London and an Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Southampton. She has also taught history at University College London and the University of Warwick. In 2014, Joanna was awarded an MBE in recognition of her work promoting British higher education internationally.

Tarrance Ryder-Downes

Association of Commonwealth Universities

Tarrance Ryder-Downes is the Director of Human Resources for the Association of Commonwealth Universities (ACU). At the ACU, Tarrance has developed the HR function from being mainly operational, to playing a key role in the strategic planning and decisions affecting the ACU’s people. He has over 15 years of human resources experience in the not-for-profit sector in the UK in progressively more senior roles. Tarrance also has a leading role in the ACU’s HR in Higher Education Community. Tarrance has an MSc in Human Resources and a bachelor’s in business and History.

Professor Shaun Ewen

University of Melbourne, Australia

Professor Shaun Ewen is Pro Vice-Chancellor (PVC) and Foundation Director of the Melbourne Poche Centre for Indigenous Health at the University of Melbourne, and visiting Professor of Indigenous Health and Leadership at King’s College London. He is also convener of the ACU’s Peace and Reconciliation Network. In his role as PVC, Professor Ewen has responsibility for institutional policy, strategy and advice in relation to all aspects of Indigenous higher education. Professor Ewen has a clinical background in physiotherapy, and holds postgraduate qualifications in international relations and education. His area of research expertise relates to Indigenous health.

Willorna Brock

Association of Commonwealth Universities

Willorna Brock is Senior HR Business Partner at the Association of Commonwealth Universities (ACU). Willorna contributes to the ACU's HR strategy and works with the Director of HR to transform HR service delivery - devising and implementing key initiatives to support the ACU’s ambition to become a high performance organisation. With a background in teaching, Willorna has worked in a variety of HR roles within the public, private and not-for profit sectors including at the London Borough of Sutton, Atkins, EY, CGI and Save the Children. She was also a Committee member at CIPD Southwest London Branch for five years during which she organised and hosted various events for members.

Abel Caine

UNESCO Mahatma Gandhi Institute of Education for Peace and Sustainable Development MGIEP, India

Abel Caine is the Head of the Rethinking Youth Programme at the UNESCO MGIEP based in New Delhi, India. To achieve the UN SDGs, particularly SDG 4.7, the MGIEP Youth Programme empowers youth (aged 18 – 34 years old) to transform non-formal and formal education systems through innovative digital pedagogies, inter-generational dialogues, and a global #KindnessMatters campaign leading to a new United Nations International Day of Kindness in 2021.

Dr Atul Chauhan

Amity University, India

Dr Atul Chauhan is the President of the not-for-profit Amity Education Group and the Chancellor of Amity Universities. Over the last 30 years, Amity has established over 10 universities and multiple schools/institutions across India and 15 countries with 175,000 students. The flagship Amity University is the number one ranked not-for-profit private university in India. Offering over 400 degrees, Amity University is highly research and innovation focused with US Regional Accreditation (WASC) and UK Accreditation (QAA). Born and educated in Germany, Dr Chauhan and studied engineering and finance from the University College London (UCL) and London School of Economics.

Dr Balvinder Shukla

Amity University Uttar Pradesh, India

Dr Shukla is a Professor of Entrepreneurship, Leadership and IT, and the Vice Chancellor of Amity University Uttar Pradesh. She has been one of the key team members spearheading the exponential growth of the Amity Group's engagement in higher education. Dr. Shukla is the recipient of numerous prestigious awards and honours for her extraordinary contribution in education, research, social engagements, and entrepreneurship development.

Beth Bundy

Auckland University of Technology, New Zealand

Beth's experience as an HR Executive over the last 20 years spans finance, IT, hospitality, education, local government, health and utilities sectors in the UK and New Zealand. In her current role as Group Director, People and Culture at Auckland University of Technology, she implemented a new People and Culture service delivery model focussed on sunsetting bureaucracy, digitising and automating transactional processing, and releasing capacity to support leaders to achieve their strategic goals. As a senior executive, she works with leaders to develop organisational cultures that attend to the history, soul and journey of an organisation.

Dr Claire Kelly

Stellenbosch University, South Africa

Dr Claire Kelly is the current Acting Head of Transformation at Stellenbosch University, South Africa. She has a long-standing interest in diversity, identity, and social change, having managed and contributed to research projects into diversity, inclusion and transformation in South African organisations and racial transformation in small towns. Her current interest is in transformation in the higher education sector, with a particular interest in the emancipatory role of the university, and what this means for the functioning of universities (as sites and systems of human relationality) at various levels.

Professor Ian O. Williamson

Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand

Ian O. Williamson is the Pro-Vice Chancellor and the Dean of the Wellington School of Business and Government at Victoria University of Wellington (New Zealand). Prior to joining Victoria University of Wellington, he served on the faculties of the Melbourne Business School (Australia), Rutgers Business School (USA), the Zurich Institute of Business Education (Switzerland), the Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland (USA) and Institut Teknologi Bandung (Indonesia). He received his Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (USA).

Kul Mahay

Ignite Your Inner Potential, UK

Kul served for 32 years in the UK police service, of which two thirds were spent at leadership level. In his life as a police leader, he oversaw complex and varied departments and commanded critical and major operational scenarios. Using his deep knowledge of Emotional Intelligence, Kul has worked with police forces, universities, fire services and the oil industry in the UK, UAE, Qatar, India and the Ukraine to help develop empowered cultures. He is the founder of the fastest growing personal leadership events company in the UK, Ignite Your Inner Potential. Kul also founded Create and Speak, a very successful intensive public speaker training programme from which he chooses his speakers for his annual events.

Lorraine Gaytten

University of Birmingham, UK

Lorraine Gaytten has more than 20 years of experience in higher education, initially as an academic but for the last 17 years she has been in leadership roles in international education and, most recently, leading a high performing professional services team at the University of Birmingham, College of Social Sciences. Planning for and managing risk and change has been a key element of her role for her entire career as she trained originally to manage time, cost and quality in a property and construction environment. Those basic principles have been used time and time again to ensure resilience in an ever-changing environment whilst looking after their greatest resource – their staff.

Dr Marilyn Thompson

University of Waterloo, Canada

Dr Marilyn Thompson is currently Associate Provost, Human Resources at the University of Waterloo, Canada, where she oversees the administration and long-term planning of all university human resources, organisational and human development, and total compensation activities and programmes. As the chief human resources officer, her responsibilities include playing a key role in strategic planning, providing both university-wide vision and HR leadership in service to Waterloo’s mission. She acts as the steward of strategies, activities and programmes that impact the people of the university, modelling best practices in leadership, learning and growth, fostering relationships, and getting things done within a complex environment.

Dr Pankaj Mittal

Association of Indian Universities, India                                                     

Dr Pankaj Mittal, Secretary General (SG) of the Association of Indian Universities (AIU), is the second female SG of the AIU in its 95 years of existence. She has been serving the higher education sector for over three decades in senior positions at the University Grants Commission of India. Dr Mittal is a Fulbright Scholar, and has also served for two terms as the first regular Vice Chancellor of Bhagat Phool Singh Mahila Vishwavidyalaya, Haryana - the first rural women’s university of North India.

Professor Paul Tiyambe Zeleza

United States International University-Africa, Kenya

Prof Paul Tiyambe Zeleza is Vice Chancellor (President) and Professor of the Humanities and Social Sciences at the United States International University-Africa, Nairobi, Kenya.  He has worked at several universities in the Caribbean, Kenya, Canada, and the United States and held distinguished academic appointments and administrative positions. Professor Zeleza’s academic work has crossed traditional boundaries, ranging from economic and intellectual history to human rights, gender studies and diaspora studies. He has published more than 300 journal articles, book chapters, reviews, short stories and online essays and authored or edited 27 books, several of which have won international awards.

Dr Sujaya Banerjee

Capstone People Consulting, India

Dr. Sujaya Banerjee is a change management professional with over 30 years of experience in driving cultural transformation, through leadership for organizations like Godrej, ADNOC, Lowe Lintas and Partners, British Gas and Essar where she was the Chief Talent Officer. Dr. Banerjee is currently Founder/CEO of Capstone People Consulting – a new age consulting firm in the space of leadership and change working with leading organisations both Indian and multinationals and also with leading government bodies.

Professor Teresa Mwuese Nmadu

University of Jos, Nigeria

Teresa Mwuese Nmadu is a professor of HR and Strategic Management and Deputy Vice Chancellor (Administration) of the University of Jos, Nigeria. She is also an international facilitator on the British Council’s Active Citizens Programme for Youth in Nigerian Universities. Her core strengths are facilitating organisational change and development in public institutions. Professor Nmadu is a 2015/2016 Fellow of the International Women’s Leadership Forum, and a member of the  Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM); United States Association of Small Business and Entrepreneurship Educators (USASBE); The Academy of Management of Nigeria (TAMN); Association of Commonwealth Universities Human Resource (ACU HR) in Higher Education (HE) West Africa 2018; and the Chartered Institute of Personnel Management of Nigeria (CIPM).

Umar Zamman

Sheffield Hallam University, UK

Umar Zamman is the Director of Human Resources & Organisational Development at Sheffield Hallam University, responsible for the HR, OD, Leadership Development, Payroll, Pensions and Electronic Data Interchange agenda for over 5,500 staff and is part of the senior leadership group. He has experience of working in a number of sectors and has held senior executive roles in HE, NHS, Fire & Rescue Service, Policing and the Civil Service and was an advisor in the private office to the Home Secretary and senior civil servants. He has led national and international projects on culture change, leadership and EDI and is focussed on integrating EDI into all HR and OD practices. 

Professor Wendel Dwight Abel

University of West Indies, Jamaica

Professor Wendel Dwight Abel, is a professor in the Department of Community Health and Psychiatry and the head of Section of Community Health & Psychiatry, UWI, MONA; he is also a consultant psychiatrist at the University Hospital of the West Indies. Professor Abel has training in medicine and psychiatry, public health and addiction studies. His academic focuses are in mental health policy, suicide, depression and cannabis.

Yusuf Saleh

Kenya Business Registration Services

Yusuf served as the Chief Manager for Human Resources at the United States International University (USIU)-Africa. Currently, he is the deputy director of Human Resources at the Kenya Business Registration services, a state corporation established under the BRS Act of 2015.

Yusuf is a full member of the Institute of Human Resources Management (IHRM) Kenya and a member of the continuing professional development (CPD) and membership committee. He served as a member of the ACU’s HR in HE Steering committee and as Regional Representative for Eastern Africa. Yusuf is an ABD doctoral candidate and holds an MBA in HR management and a BSc degree in international business administration with a specialty in finance and management.