Carol Stanfield
Senior Research Fellow
Carol is an independent consultant with 25 years’ experience in skills and labour market research. As a Senior Research Fellow at the ERC she supports the delivery of core and commissioned projects. These projects have explored issues such as productivity drivers in firms, the innovation ecosystems for physics, chemistry and Biotech businesses and SME attitudes to Intellectual Property.
Effie Kesidou
Professor of Economics of Innovation & Sustainability
Effie Kesidou has a Chair in Economics of Innovation and Sustainability at Leeds University Business School, is the Head of the Graduate School in the Business Faculty, University of Leeds and a CORD Fellow at the Center for Organization Research & Design, Arizona State University. Her research is interdisciplinary and uses applied economic methods to understand how businesses and cities can become more sustainable via innovation.
Ian Drummond
Research Consultant
After working as an academic geographer for a number of years, Ian joined the civil service in 1999. After spending two years at the Department for Education, he joined the Small Business Service in 2001. Following the closure of the SBS in 2004, he moved to the DTI and worked in its successor departments until 2019. Throughout this time Ian’s role primarily involved developing the evidence base used to inform entrepreneurship and small business policy development.
James H Love
Professor of International Business.
Jim Love Is Professor of International Business at Leeds University Business School. He previously held Chairs in international business and economics at Aston, Birmingham and Warwick Universities, and earlier worked in the economics department at Strathclyde University. His background is in applied microeconomics, principally in the fields of international business and innovation. Most of his work is empirical, using firm-level datasets. Jim is a senior researcher in the Enterprise Research Centre, an independent research organisation which conducts policy-relevant research on SME growth and development. His work here is innovation, exporting and growth in SMEs
Jane Bourke
Lecturer in Economics
Dr. Jane Bourke is a Senior Lecturer in Economics, University College Cork.
Jane’s research interests are in the area of firm-level innovation, technology adoption and micro-businesses. She is also interested in the adoption of innovations and digital technologies in health care.
Jun Du
Professor of Economics
Jun Du holds the position of Professor of Economics at Aston University and serves as the leader of work package 4 within the ERC project "Internationalisation and Productivity." Additionally, Jun is the head of the Centre for Business Prosperity (CBP). Her current research focus revolves around formulating global business strategies encompassing international trade, investment, and technological advancements.
Karen Bonner
Senior Economist
Karen is a senior economist at Ulster University’s Economic Policy Centre and also works with the ERC on projects relating to entrepreneurship, business demography and innovation. She is involved primarily in firm-level economic research utilising micro-data to examine aspects of firm performance in both Northern Ireland and the UK. Karen works with ERC members to produce the UK Global Entrepreneurship Monitor. Other recent projects include those for BEIS, DfE, and Scottish Enterprise. Previously she worked as a Lecturer in Entrepreneurship at Queen’s University, Belfast.
Kevin Mole
Associate Professor of Enterprise & Head of Group
Kevin's expertise ranges across a variety of qualitative and quantitative research techniques: on external advice to small firms, the diagnosis of firm problems, policy choices in business support, firm growth and the adoption of new working practices in SMEs.
Monder Ram OBE
Director, Centre for Research in Ethnic Minority Entrepreneurship (CREME)
Professor Monder Ram OBE is the Director of Centre for Research in Ethnic Minority Entrepreneurship (CREME), based in Aston Business School, Aston University. He has extensive experience of working in, researching and acting as a consultant to small and ethnic minority businesses. He is a leading authority on small business and ethnic minority entrepreneurship research and has published widely on the subject.
Neha Prashar
Lecturer in Entrepreneurship
Neha gained her Bachelor’s degree in Mathematics with Economics at University College London and went onto do her Master’s degree in Development Economics at the University of Birmingham.
Nola Hewitt-Dundas
Pro-Vice-Chancellor, Queen’s University Belfast
Nola Hewitt-Dundas is Professor of Innovation Management and Policy and Pro Vice-Chancellor for the Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences at Queen’s University Belfast. She has published consistently in leading international journals on innovation systems, the micro-economics of business innovation and university-business collaboration. An internationally recognised expert, she has provided advice to national and international organisations and serves on the Board of UKRI.
