Equity, diversity and inclusion

Postgraduate researcher, Clare Matysova (University of Leeds), is interviewed by Emily Humphreys (London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine), as part of the Business School’s Research and Innovation podcast series for International Women’s Day 2023. In this episode, Emily and Clare discuss how the gender pay gap is linked with parental leave, the difference between inequalities and inequities within parental leave, and what practical solutions the government and employers should be considering to make parental leave more equitable. 

This podcast episode was recorded remotely in March 2023. If you would like to get in touch regarding this podcast, please contact research.lubs@leeds.ac.uk. A transcript of this episode is available. https://business.leeds.ac.uk/downloads/download/296/international_womens_day_2023_research_podcast_series

About the speakers: 

Clare Matysova is a postgraduate researcher in the Centre for Employment Relations, Innovation and Change at the University of Leeds, focusing on gender equality and exploring the impact of the UK’s shared parental leave policy from the perspective of couples’ decision-making. Clare also currently works as a Senior Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Partner at the University of Aberdeen. She has been working in EDI-related roles within HE for the past 15 years. Previously, she worked at London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, the University of East London and the University for the Creative Arts.   

Emily Humphreys is a part-time PhD student in social epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine. She also works part-time in public health, with experience in policy development and interests in mental health, wellbeing and health inequalities. She is particularly interested in how local or national government policies can affect health outcomes. She joined LSHTM as a research student in September 2021. Her research is investigating how changes to maternity, paternity and parental leave policies in the UK might have affected mental health for parents.

The inequities within parental leave

Professor Jennifer Tomlinson speaks to Dr Jack Daly about his research that explores the role of men and masculinity in the gender pay gap, focusing on the legal and financial professions. They discuss how the gender pay gap can’t solely be closed by providing equal opportunities for women when careers remain structured in a way that disproportionately favours male behaviours and traits. 

This podcast episode was recorded remotely in March 2023. If you would like to get in touch regarding this podcast, please contact research.lubs@leeds.ac.uk. A transcript of this episode is available.  https://business.leeds.ac.uk/downloads/download/296/international_womens_day_2023_research_podcast_series

About the speakers: Dr Jack Daly is a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow in Work and Employment Relations. His research focuses on equality, diversity and inclusion in traditionally male-dominated industries, with a specific interest in the role of men as resistance to and facilitators of inclusive working practices.  

Jennifer Tomlinson is Professor of Gender and Employment Relations at the Centre for Employment Relations, Innovation and Change. Her research focuses on gender and social inequalities in organisational, occupational and labour market contexts.

The gender pay gap in the financial and legal services: why equal opportunities aren’t enough

Dr Asiya Islam (Leeds University Business School) is joined by Nishi Khandelwal (Nirantar) to discuss their research project on gender inequalities in digital India, exploring digital literacy, access and use. Asiya and Nishi also talk about the work Nirantar does, as well as the intersection between location (rural and urban), caste and gender when it comes to digital literacy in India. 

Read the working paper: https://digit-research.org/publication/gender-inequalities-in-digital-india-a-survey-on-digital-literacy-access-and-use/  

Visit the project webpage. https://business.leeds.ac.uk/faculty/dir-record/research-projects/1946/gender-digital-technology-and-the-future-of-work-in-india  

This podcast episode was recorded remotely in March 2023. If you would like to get in touch regarding this podcast, please contact research.lubs@leeds.ac.uk. A transcript of this episode is available.    

About the speakers: Asiya Islam is Lecturer in Work and Employment Relations. Her research interests are in gender, class, emerging forms of work, particularly service work, and feminist research methods. 

Nishi Khandelwal heads the Women’s Literacy, Education, and Empowerment work at Nirantar, where she plays a crucial role in visualizing and planning the women's education programme, and training project staff and teachers of partner organisations. She is interested in researching issues around digital literacy of women and young girls to further strengthen their literacy and digital literacy skills.

Gender inequalities in digital India

In this episode, Drs Bianca Orsi, Peter Hughes and Juliane Scheffel talk about their project “WISE - Women into Studying Economics” - a research project that is tackling the gender imbalance in economics. They discuss why so few women choose to study economics, the stereotypes that discourage them, and the impact a lack of diversity in the field has on policy and society. Through school visits and conversations with students, the team is uncovering key barriers and working to change perceptions.  
 
Visit the project webpage. https://business.leeds.ac.uk/faculty/dir-record/research-projects/2060/women-into-studying-economics-wise

This episode was recorded on 26th February 2025. If you would like to get in touch regarding this episode, please contact research.lubs@leeds.ac.uk. A transcript of this episode is available. https://business.leeds.ac.uk/downloads/download/355/podcast-transcript---addressing-the-gender-gap-in-economics

About the speakers: 

Dr Bianca Orsi is a lecturer in economics at Leeds University Business School. Her main research interests are on monetary policy, monetary policy transmission mechanism, inflation, capital controls, interest rate, exchange rate, currency internationalization and currency hierarchy, financial integration.  
https://business.leeds.ac.uk/departments-economics/staff/556/dr-bianca-orsi 
 
Dr Peter Hughes is also a lecturer in economics at Leeds University Business School. His areas of expertise are: monetary economics, behavioural economics, institutional economics, money, history of economic thought, and economic methodology. 
https://business.leeds.ac.uk/departments-economics/staff/127/dr-peter-t-hughes 
 
Dr Juliane Scheffel is an associate professor in economics at the Business School. Her research interests are in: labour economics, development economics, migration, education, and elderly care. 
https://business.leeds.ac.uk/departments-economics/staff/141/dr-juliane-scheffel  

Addressing the gender gap in economics

Professor Nick Williams speaks to Dr Lee Wainwright about Lee’s research on how restorative entrepreneurship can empower marginalised individuals to reclaim social and economic standing. They discuss ableist workplace norms, the parallels between societal treatment of disabled individuals and other marginalised groups, and recommendations for creating a more inclusive workplace. 

This episode was recorded on 5th March 2025. If you would like to get in touch regarding this episode, please contact research.lubs@leeds.ac.uk. A transcript of this episode is available.

Read the book: The Routledge Companion to Disability and Work, Edited by Oana Branzei, Anica Zeyen. Lee Wainwright’s chapter: Disability and Restoration Work. 

About the speakers: Nick Williams is Professor of Entrepreneurship at Leeds University Business School. His research mainly focuses on entrepreneurship in challenging contexts, and he has particular interests in the role of entrepreneurial activity in crises. Lee Wainwright is a Lecturer in Entrepreneurship Studies at Leeds University Business School. His research focuses on how entrepreneurship can act as a process to take people out of restrictive or oppressive contexts. 

Challenging ableism in the workplace through restorative entrepreneurship

Dr Alexander Beresford speaks to Dr Temitayo Odeyemi about Temitayo’s research, exploring the key complexities and challenges of just transition in Nigeria. They discuss the involvement of Nigeria’s labour unions and sector-specific unions in shaping government policies around just transitions, and the different conversations that are happening at a national and subnational level when it comes to just transitions and the concept of decent work. 

This project is funded by the Hans Böckler Foundation – Just Transition: Aktivitäten im internationalen Vergleich 2021-582-2. 

Visit the project webpage. https://business.leeds.ac.uk/dir-record/research-projects/1990/just-transition-action-concepts-debates-and-strategies-an-international-comparison-across-11-countries

This podcast episode was recorded remotely in May 2025. If you would like to get in touch regarding this podcast, please contact research.lubs@leeds.ac.uk. A transcript of this episode is available. 

About the speakers:  

Dr Alexander Beresford is an Associate Professor in African Politics, and Director of Research and Innovation for the School of Politics and International Studies at the University of Leeds. His research provides a multi-layered insight into how global normative order is mediated and contested within and between two interwoven spaces - political struggles over inequality, power and corruption from everyday sites of politics through to the highest tables of power in South Africa; and the global diplomatic contestation of vaccine access, conflict resolution and climate change led by South Africa as an emerging power.   

Dr Temitayo Odeyemi is a Visiting Research Fellow at the School of Politics and International Studies, University of Leeds, and Visiting Fellow at the Institute for Parliamentary Research, Berlin, Germany. His PhD research at the University of Leeds (2024) explored the public engagement repertoires of the Nigerian national and subnational Lagos State legislatures. This built on his wider interest in how key democratic institutions drive resilience and sustainability through connections with non-state actors and everyday citizens, particularly in Sub-Saharan African contexts. 

Just Transitions – a global exploration: Nigeria

Ying Zhang - research poster

Luke Nolan - research poster

Yagiz Talay - research poster

Addi Manolopoulou speaks to Professor Steve Toms about his latest book - “Systems of Deceit – Financial Fraud and Scandal in the United Kingdon, 1700-2010.” Professor Toms explains the historical roots and systemic causes of financial crime in the UK, revealing how economic structures, deregulation, and shifting sectoral dominance have shaped fraud over the past 300 years. 

This episode was recorded in May 2025. If you would like to get in touch regarding this episode, please contact research.lubs@leeds.ac.uk. A transcript of this episode is available.  

Read the book: “Systems of Deceit - Financial Fraud and Scandal in the United Kingdom, 1700–2010”, Steven Toms  

About the speakers: 

Addi Manolopoulou is the Departmental Manager for the Accounting and Finance Department at Leeds University Business School. She is committed to translating complex research into real-world impact.   

Professor Steve Toms is Chair in Accounting. His research interests cover the role of accounting (including forensic accounting), accountability, and corporate governance in the development of organisations, particularly from a historical perspective. 

300 years of deceit: a systemic look at financial crime in the UK

After delivering insightful presentations at the Legal Tech in Leeds 2025 conference, Dr Virág Blazsek and Professor Danat Valizade have come together on our podcast to share some of the key themes they discussed at the event. In this episode, they talk about how legal tech growth is shaped by two main areas - workforce change and energy policy. 

This episode was recorded on 24th June 2025. If you would like to get in touch regarding this episode, please contact research.lubs@leeds.ac.uk. A transcript of this episode is available.  

About the speakers:  

Dr Virág Blazsek is a Lecturer in Commercial, Corporate, and Banking Law and a Deputy Director of the Centre for Business Law and Practice (CBLP) at the University of Leeds School of Law. Her recent research, supported by the Michael Beverley Innovation Fellowship, examines FinTech hub development and financial sector transformation in secondary financial centres, focusing on Leeds, the US, and Singapore. The project highlighted the vital role of regional legal and tech clusters - like Leeds - in strengthening the UK’s LegalTech sector, largely due to their strong underlying real economies. 

Danat Valizade is Professor of Quantitative Employment Research at Leeds University Business School. His research focuses on labour market inequalities and the future of work; job quality; advanced econometrics, and machine learning. 

The two forces driving legal tech growth: people and power

Addi Manolopoulou speaks to Professors Shima Amini and Abdul Mohamed about their recent research on how climate change risk affects the performance of newly listed firms in the US. The discussion highlights how drought exposure, investor sentiment, and mandatory climate disclosures influence Initial Public Offerings (IPO) outcomes. With implications for investors, policy makers, and company leaders, the findings position climate risk as a financial concern, not just an environmental one. 

This episode was recorded in July 2025. If you would like to get in touch regarding this episode, please contact research.lubs@leeds.ac.uk. A transcript of this episode is available.  

Read the journal article: “Climate change risk, investor sentiment, and the performance of new entrant firms”, Small Business Economics. 

About the speakers: 

Addi Manolopoulou is the Departmental Manager for the Accounting and Finance Department at Leeds University Business School. She is committed to translating complex research into real-world impact.   

Professor Shima Amini is Chair in Entrepreneurial Finance. Her research is focused on entrepreneurial finance, initial public offering, venture capital, private equity, corporate finance, behavioural finance, and market microstructure.   

Professor Abdul Mohamed is Chair in Accounting and Finance. His research interests are in the area of corporate finance, venture capital, bankruptcy, and market-based accounting research. 

Climate change as a financial risk: what new firms and investors need to know

In this episode, Professor Magda Osman and Dr Sarah Jenkins discuss risk communication - exploring what role the social sciences play in risk communications, whether it can ever be objective, how people perceive and tolerate risk differently, and how trade-offs and context shape the risk decisions people make. 

This episode was recorded on 4th August 2025. If you would like to get in touch regarding this episode, please contact research.lubs@leeds.ac.uk. A transcript of this episode is available.  https://business.leeds.ac.uk/downloads/download/379/podcast-transcript-making-sense-of-risk-communications

About the speakers:  

Magda Osman holds a Visiting Professor of Impact position at Leeds University Business School, University of Leeds, and is a Research Professor at the Cambridge Judge Business School, University of Cambridge. She is a psychologist by training, with a specific interest in decision-making under risk and uncertainty, risk analysis and causal analysis, folk beliefs in the manipulation of the unconscious, as well as an interest in examining effectiveness of methods of behavioural change. 

Dr Sarah Jenkins is a Lecturer in Applied Decision-Making and a cognitive psychologist, with extensive experience of conducting applied research focusing on how people understand, communicate and make decisions concerning risk and uncertainty. She holds a joint post between the Centre for Decision Research at Leeds University Business School, and the Met Office, where she is applying social science techniques to deliver high-impact decision research in areas related to weather and climate.

Making sense of risk communications: framing, trust, and trade-offs

In this introductory episode, Professor Helen Hughes and Emma Findlay explain the purpose of the Surgical Care Observatory and why successful surgical innovation is about far more than the tech itself. They discuss system readiness, and how sociotechnical frameworks can help the NHS implement new technologies safely, effectively, and sustainably.

This episode was recorded on 24th November 2025. If you would like to get in touch regarding this episode, please contact research.lubs@leeds.ac.uk. A transcript of this episode is available. https://business.leeds.ac.uk/downloads/download/383/podcast-transcript---introducing-the-surgical-care-observatory

Visit the project webpage: https://business.leeds.ac.uk/faculty/dir-record/research-projects/2425/surgical-care-observatory-healthtech-research-centre-in-accelerated-surgical-care

This project is funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR).

About the speakers: Dr Helen Hughes is an Associate Professor at Leeds University Business School and Director of the Behaviour Lab. Helen in an interdisciplinary researcher, whose research spans aerospace to healthcare sectors.  Helen is currently an Associate Editor at Ergonomics journal, and a Co-Investigator within the NIHR-funded Surgical Health-Tech Research Centre, where she leads the ‘Surgical Observatory’ workstream. 

Emma Findlay is a Research Officer at Leeds University Business School, working in the Surgical Care Observatory theme of the HealthTech Research Centre in Accelerated Surgical Care.  Her research explores the underpinning psychology of complex systems; including medtech implementation, surgical sustainability and multiteam system functioning. 

Articles mentioned in this episode and related reading:

“Organisational psychologists – essential to saving the NHS”, The Psychologist, 31 October 2025, Helen Hughes and Emma Findlay  
“The Principles of Sociotechnical Design”, Human Relations, Albert Cherns, 1976  
“Sociotechnical principles for system design”, Applied Ergonomics, Chris Clegg, 2000
“Leveraging socio-technical systems to tackle grand challenges: Reflections on human-robot teams, hybrid workplaces, med-tech, and digital transformation”, Ergonomics, Matthew Davis, Helen Hughes, Mark Robinson, Jeffery Scales, Shankar Sankaran, Dikai Liu, Emma Findlay and Emma Gritt, 2025

Introducing the Surgical Care Observatory – why sociotechnical thinking is needed within the NHS

In this episode of the Research and Innovation Podcast, Rashik Parmar MBE, and Professor Mehmet Dogar explore advances in artificial intelligence, responsible computing, and robotics. They discuss why responsible computing is becoming urgent, the challenges of making digital systems ethical and sustainable, and the ambition to position the UK as a world-leader in this space. Mehmet shares insights from the University of Leeds Robotics Lab, including why robotics lags behind other areas of AI and how researchers are tackling complex tasks like multi-object packing and physical interaction. Together, they look ahead to what responsible, trustworthy computing and more capable robots could mean for society in the coming years. 

Both Rashik and Mehmet presented on these topics at the Leeds Digital Festival event - “The future is now: tech driving UK industry” - which was co-hosted by Leeds University Business School and the School of Computer Science.  

Mehmet’s research is supported by the UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council [EP/V052659/1] 

This episode was recorded on 8 December 2025. If you would like to get in touch regarding this episode, please contact research.lubs@leeds.ac.uk. A transcript of this episode is available. 

About the speakers: 

Rashik Parmar MBE is a member of Leeds University Business School’s Research International Advisory Board. Previously, Rashik was Group CEO of British Computer Society (BCS), and the IBM Fellow and Vice President responsible for creating and driving IBM’s European technical strategy. Rashik is a member of the Open University Council and also chairs Industry Advisory Board for Digit Lab. 

Professor Mehmet Dogar is Professor of Robotics & AI at the University of Leeds. His research focuses on autonomous robotic manipulation. Mehmet is an EPSRC Fellow, and an Associate Editor for the International Journal of Robotics Research, and an Associate Editor for the IEEE Transactions on Robotics.

Towards a world of ethical computing and smarter robots

Leeds University Business School’s Research and Innovation podcast brings you insights from our expert researchers. From the future of work, to disruptive technologies; green behaviours to emerging markets, we’ll be covering a wide-range of topical issues and novel ideas. 

Listen to the podcast to find out more about our research and how it’s inspiring business managers, informing policymakers and influencing society.

If you have any comments regarding any of these episodes, please contact research.lubs@leeds.ac.uk.

The inequities within parental leave

Leeds University Business School

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