Patricia has sought to make visible the way in which organisations, leaders & entrepreneurs are subject to and constituted by gendered cultural norms and how such constitution contributes to inequality.
Her research emerges from a fascination with the dynamic durability of inequality based on gender and other forms of difference and she has led several research agendas in the gender and organisation studies field to build understanding of its changing form. This includes work on the gendered nature of entrepreneurship manifest in its inherent masculinity, the emergence of feminised entrepreneurship, the development of the concept of entrepreneurial femininity and the identification of the mumpreneur as an enterprise character.
Google Scholar designated her 2006 paper on the masculine norm published in Gender, Work & Organization as a classic paper in Gender Studies, ranked no. 5 in the top 10 cited papers published in 2006. Her current work on postfeminism is influencing the intellectual agenda of the gender and organizations field acting as a catalyst for a developing stream of research in the area. Between 2015 and 2018, she was involved in the organisation of an ESRC seminar series entitled Exploring Gendered Inclusion in Contemporary Organizations with colleagues from Cranfield University, Middlesex University and the University of Essex.
Connected to this project, she was the lead editor of a Special Issue of Gender, Work & Organization on the subject of Moderate Feminism(s), published in August 2019. The Leverhulme Trust recently awarded her a two-year Research Fellowship that commenced in January 2019. This is supporting completion of a project on leadership in the City of London entitled Postfeminism in the City. An international panel of gender scholars appointed her Joint-Editor-in-Chief of Gender, Work & Organization in January 2018 and she is hosting the 11th Biennial International Interdisciplinary Gender, Work & Organization Conference at the University of Kent Canterbury campus 24th to 26th June 2020.
Patricia’s research is located in the broad area of gender and organisation studies.
Patricia has published her work in a range of journals including:
Her most recently published book (edited with Yvonne Benschop and Ruth Simpson) is Postfeminism and Organization, Routledge.
As a Leverhulme Research Fellow, Patricia is currently on leave from teaching. Normally, she convenes the following modules:
Current Supervisees
Past Supervisees