Professor Hannah Holmes is Dean of the Business School and Deputy Pro-Vice-Chancellor within the Faculty of Business and Law at Manchester Metropolitan University. She is also a Principal Fellow of the HEA and Chair of the Economic Review Editorial Board. She holds several external Board and Trustee positions, including Prospere Learning Trust and the Manchester Metropolitan University Board of Governors.

Prof. Holmes is also part of the Business School Impact System (BSIS) Assessment Experts Pool. It is our pleasure to share some insights into her professional life path.

Can you please introduce yourself and share your background in the realm of business education?

I am Professor Hannah Holmes, Dean of Business School at Manchester Metropolitan University. I have been working in higher education since 2015, and throughout this time, I have been committed to creating environments where students can thrive and achieve their best. This is both through the curriculum, extracurricular activities, post-study opportunities, and skills development and through the experiences and ambitions of both staff and students being positively aligned. In recognition of my work in improving student outcomes and experiences, I was appointed to the position of Professor of Business Education, a position I use to influence change within my university and across the sector.

How has being involved with BSIS influenced your perspective on business education and institutional development?

My involvement in BSIS has enhanced my own understanding of impactful practice and meaningful action. Through BSIS, I am privileged to connect with global schools and learn from them. BSIS has helped me and our business school in general, to be focused on making a difference and to deliver on our commitment to transform lives. Through the engagement with BSIS, I better understand the difference between taking action and achieving impact, and as a consequence, this transcends a lot into what I do with the intention of ensuring that actions lead to positive and tangible results. Based on this approach, and on the recommendations of our first BSIS assessment, our business school is able to better record our impact – we produce reports with measurable outcomes which help us in our communication both internally and externally. It also allows us to celebrate our impact at a collective and an individual level.

Could you tell us about your school’s decision to undertake the BSIS assessment?

Our business school is very proud of the impact that arises from our education and research. We have always had a very applied approach to all of our activities, and BSIS was an opportunity to really measure, appreciate, and celebrate our impact. We see BSIS as a helpful tool for providing stakeholders with evidence and verification of the business school’s role and importance, as well as offering an independent analysis of the difference we make in our defined region.

What were the key objectives behind your school’s participation in the BSIS process?

To have a means to independently evaluate our impact and to create an evidence base to use with our key stakeholders internally and externally.

How has your school benefited from engaging with the BSIS framework and assessment?

We have benefitted immensely from undergoing this exercise, collecting data that we didn’t previously collect and analysing them. Another benefit has derived from engaging with the BSIS network. We’ve tried to contribute positively to the BSIS network through showcasing events at our business school with the aim to bring the community together, to network and to share our own impactful work. The annual impact reports that we create, as a direct result of the BSIS recommendations, help us to regularly review and understand the impact we are making and evaluate how we can progress further in order to achieve even more positive impact.

Can you share with us the journey that led you to your current role and how your background in the field has influenced your approach to (societal) impact?

At university, I studied economics all the way from the undergraduate level until the completion of my PhD. Studying economics really opened my eyes to societal challenges and global disparities. As I progressed through my studies, I focused more on how society can collectively influence positive outcomes through consumption. My research focused on the impact of consumer boycotts grounded in consumers’ opposition to labour standards, and, the impact of fair trade on farmers.

My broader studies of economics, paired with my own research area, have helped me to see that, through comprehension of a challenge, even on an international scale, actions foster impact and can drive positive change. Another strong influence of my perspective on societal impact is my experience as a first-generation student. This has made me passionate about widening participation and access to education as a means of transforming students futures. I advocate for a culture that enables students and academics to realise their potential, irrespective of their background or prior experiences.

What specific initiatives or projects have you been involved in that align with the mission of the Business School Impact System, promoting societal development through leadership and practice?

My work on equality, diversity, inclusion, and belonging is probably the example that I am most passionate about. In the business school I introduced, I now chair an ED&I Delivery Group that focuses on ensuring an inclusive student and staff experience. Through this group, we’re driving change in staff representation at all levels, with our latest initiative being an accountability model focused on inclusive recruitment. We also work to ensure ED&I is central to our research and education strategies.

For example, in education, we are concentrating on eliminating racial disparities in awards and progression, and we are creating strategies to address these gaps in student outcomes. Another area that I am very proud to have led is the introduction of a strengths-based approach to employability. This has now impacted over 8,000 lives and resulted in improved graduate outcomes for our accounting and finance students, reporting greater confidence in their career readiness and increased satisfaction with the student support mechanisms we have at the university. This work was recognised by AMBA in 2024 when we won the award for “Best Innovation Strategy.”

How do you ensure that your work has a lasting impact beyond your immediate sphere of influence, and what strategies do you employ to scale your efforts for a broader reach?

I am very committed to sharing good practice and to supporting a culture within our business school that is very open to sharing and supporting each other and the wider global higher education sector. I, and everyone in our business school, are passionate about connecting people and building regional, national, and international partnerships that align with our values and passion to transform lives, businesses, and communities. Personally, I also try to support people through mentoring to ensure that they can flourish in their roles and make a difference.

Make sure to follow the latest EFMD events calendar and share your viewpoint on the current trends in the use of AI tools in business education during the 2024 BSIS Symposium: AI in business education for positive impact! Register here.

Find out more about BSIS, EFMD and FNEGE.

For additional insights, announcements and perspectives about BSIS, visit the conversation here.