WWRG Members
The Women and Work Research Group (WWRG) comprises academics from Work and Organisational Studies in the School of Business at the University of Sydney.
Academics with an interest in women and work from other disciplines are also invited to participate.
Research Profiles
| Member | Research Interests | Current Research |
|---|---|---|
Dr Susan Ainsworth |
Older women workers, age discrimination and public policy |
Gender, age and aesthetic labour (with Dr Leanne Cutcher) and affirmative action in Australia |
Dr Marian Baird |
Convenor of the Women and Work Research Group. Marian has written extensively about women, work and family and maternity and parental leave in Australia. She has many connections with policy makers in the business, union and community sectors at both State and Federal levels. Marian has undertaken a number of large research projects, including the Parental Leave in Australia Study, a 'Dual Agenda' study of gender equity and organisational efficiency in Australian organisations and an evaluation of the impact of Work Choices on low paid employees. Marian has published widely, is a regular journal columnist to BOSS magazine and is frequently invited to speak to the media. Marian is also an Affiliated Faculty Member of the Workplace Centre at MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), Cambridge, USA. |
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Dr Rae Cooper |
Agency in employment relations and is particularly interested in bargaining structures, processes and outcomes. Her PhD examined the strategies of female dominated unions in the 1990s. |
The impact of WorkChoices for Australian women workers |
Dr Leanne Cutcher |
She has published with Dr Marian Baird on paid maternity leave in Australia as well as has written on gender and consumption. |
Investigating the construction of working mothers in public debate about paid maternity leave (with Dr Susan Ainsworth) and strategic management in the not-for-profit sector. |
Dr Teresa Davis |
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A/Prof. Bradon Ellem |
Studies of unions, women's paid labour, local industrial relations and gender politics in the cold war. His first book was a study of the history of trade unionism in the Australian clothing industry |
The sources and impacts of government industrial relations policy and changes in the geographies of work and unionism. |
Dr Melissa Gregg |
Dr Melissa Greggis a Lecturer in Gender and Cultural Studies at the University of Sydney. Her research focuses on emotional and affective labour and the impact of online technology on professional work practices. Melissa's ARC Fellowship, Working From Home: New media technology, workplace culture and the changing nature of domesticity, was one of the first Australian studies to demonstrate the psychological impact of online technology and its role in extending working hours. Work's Intimacy, the book arising from the study, will be published by Polity Press in 2010. |
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Dimitria Groutsis |
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Research Associate for the women and work group, Alexandra is a lawyer and has worked in policy and project management capacities in the NGO, public and private sectors in Australia, the UK and France, with an emphasis on gender and employment issues. Before leaving the UK at the end of 2008, she was working on embedding equality and diversity practice in a national UK NGO. Publications include a paper for the OECD/EU on migrant women and work |
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Dr Elizabeth Hill |
Liz is currently working on two research programs. One focuses on Indian women workers and feminist interventions for work-life reform in informal labour markets. The other concentrates on the development of work and family policies in Australia and their impact on gender equality. |
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Dr Suzanne Jamieson |
OHS prosecutions, for which she shares an ARC Discovery Grant, and in the area of equity for women including equal pay and in particular the role of the law in the equality project. |
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Sarah Kaine |
Employer strategy in the residential aged care sector in NSW and the role of regulatory constraints on the shaping of that strategy. In particular Sarah is interested in how the gendered nature of the aged care workforce impacts on the determination of pay and conditions and the expression of employee voice within the sector. |
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Dr Anja Kirsch |
Her research interests include gender equality in trade unions, union mergers as a revitalization strategy, and the impact of globalization on industrial relations and human resource management in the retail banking and automobile assembly industries. |
A research project examining the link between gender equality policies and union revitalization, and examining the effect of quotas for leadership positions in unions on union culture, priorities and agendas. |
Renee Kramer |
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Russell Lansbury |
International and comparative aspects of industrial relations. In a recent publication with Marian Baird, he argued the case for 'a working families' agenda' for Australia |
The impact of globalisation on employment relations in the automotive and banking industries in various countries. He is interested in the employment relations policies of multinational enterprises and how these influence practices at the national level in different economic and political systems. |
Helena Liu |
Leadership and discourse |
The ways in which leaders construct a coherent and authentic identity through life stories published in the media, with particular attention to how male and female leaders across different cultures differ in their approach. |
Dr Susan McGrath-Champ |
Alternative explanations of the 'glass ceiling', men as primary care-givers within families, training and performance of international assignees, and the spatial aspects of industrial relations |
A joint ARC-industry funded research project on the construction industry |
Dr Gabrielle Meagher |
She is currently working on two research programs. One focuses on paid care work, examining gender dimensions of how work in this female-dominated labour market is performed, organised, and valued. The second examines Australians attitudes to unions, work, and the welfare state. |
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John Murray |
Interactions between households and the labour market. |
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Karen Reeves |
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Professor Joellen Riley |
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Stuart Rosewarne |
Research interests are concentrated on international political economy and in particular international labour market formation with a focus on international migration, including the feminisation of labour migration. |
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Dr Belinda Smith |
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Dr Raymond Trau |
Raymond's research focuses on exploring the psychological processes and contextual influences that underlie the social relations between majorities and minorities in the workplace and the consequences of these factors on the interactions and work and career outcomes for both majority and minority employees in organisations. Raymond currently is a co-director of Diversity Consortium (a network of diversity practitioners and scholars) based at The University of Queensland and is on the board of Pride In Diversity Program (a new joint initiative by ACON and Diversity Council of Australia). |
Raymond is currently working on several projects. One is a collaborative project with a security and policing organisation on the role of team leaders in diverse workgroups. Two projects examine the workplace experience of lesbians and gay men. Another project, collaborating with colleagues in China, focuses on work-family conflicts in China. A fifth examines negative stereotypes towards professional working mothers and another investigates stereotype threat experienced by Asian Australians. |
Dr Diane van den Broek |
Employment relations within Australian service industries. Her most recent research focuses on the nature of 'soft' skills required within contemporary service work and the emotional and aesthetic labour required in many female dominated sectors. Other recent research looks at the ambiguous and contradictory impacts of globalisation on women and the way local market reforms can be both empower and constrain women?s labour and gender ideology. |
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Sue Williamson |
How parties bargain for family provisions in collective enterprise agreements in a changing workplace relations environment. Her research uses case studies to uncover bargaining processes, to identify how gender is manifest in collective enterprise bargaining and how this impacts on negotiating family provisions. |
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Ms Sarah Wise |
The implementation and operation of work-life balance and family-friendly policies in the UK. Sarah has also researched the extent to which gender equality has been mainstreamed into careers education, trade unions? bargaining agenda and in the provision on social inclusion programmes. |
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Jeaney Yip |
The nexus of consumption and culture with a focus on women, ethnic, young people and religious subcultures. She engages in research which perceives products as cultural constructions that reflect an underlying discourse. |
Her current research projects involve how Christian music constructs meaning that reflect a persistent tension between sacred and secular, as well as the representation of women in Christian media |
and contributing to a book on UK maternity and parental rights. She has also written a paper for the then UK Equal Opportunities Commission in 2004, "