La Trobe Business School Executive
The La Trobe Business School is led by an executive team committed to enhancing business learning through education and research that is innovative, engaged, responsible and sustainable.
Professor Aron O’Cass
Professor Aron O’Cass is the Dean of the La Trobe Business School. He is a world-renowned expert in marketing strategy, innovation and new product development, brand management and data analysis, and a champion of industry engagement in higher education. Aron brings together insights from strategy, firm resources and capabilities, and examines their effect on branding, value creation, innovation and firm performance in the context of goods and services. Aron has published many articles in leading international journals, receiving over 22,000 citations (H-index of 71 google). He is rated in the top 1% of research productive marketing scholars globally for both career and single year impact. Aron has been a Chief Investigator on Australian Research Council Discovery and Industrial Training Centre grants and served on the Australian Research Council College of Experts and on the Excellence in Research Australia Committee.
Professor Axel Schulz
Professor Axel Schulz is the Deputy Dean and the Associate Dean, Research and Industry Engagement in the La Trobe Business School. Prior to joining the La Trobe Business School, Axel was a Professor at Monash University and an Associate Professor at The University of Melbourne. He specialises in behavioural accounting with a focus on the design of management control systems, performance measurement systems and incentive system design. He has published widely in leading accounting journals including the Journal of Accounting Research, Accounting, Organizations and Society, Journal of Management Accounting Research, Management Accounting Research, Behavioural Research in Accounting and Accounting and Finance.
Associate Professor Michael Volkov
Associate Professor Michael Volkov is the Associate Dean, Learning and Teaching in the La Trobe Business School. With over 20 years’ experience in higher education and a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, he places students and staff at the centre of his endeavours. Michael is regularly invited to present at other institutions and serve on expert and advisory panels in matters of learning and teaching, accreditation, curriculum design and strategy, and appointments. His research focuses on consumer behaviour and teaching and learning, with publications appearing in leading international journals including the European Journal of Marketing, British Journal of Educational Technology, Education &Training, Journal of Marketing Management, Marketing Intelligence and Planning, and International Journal of Pedagogies and Learning. He is co-author of the leading international textbook, Principles of Marketing, with Gary Armstrong, Sara Denize and Philip Kotler.
Professor Panos Piperopoulos
Professor Panos Piperopoulos is the Associate Dean, Academic Partnerships International and Professor of Strategic Management in the La Trobe Business School. Panos has served in different roles and leadership positions at academic institutions in Australia, the United Kingdom, Greece and Hong Kong. For many years, he was a business consultant and a mentor to several successful entrepreneurial start-ups and small-to-medium enterprises. Panos has also been the principal or academic team member on competitive and industry grants worth approximately $A1.4 million. His work has been published in Research Policy, Journal of World Business, Entrepreneurship & Regional Development, Journal of Small Business Management, Journal of Environmental Management and International Small Business Journal.
Dr Nicola McNeil
Dr Nicola McNeil is Head of the Department of Management and Marketing in the La Trobe Business School. She is a leading educator in human resource management and research methods and received the Vice-Chancellor’s Commendation for Excellence in Teaching in 2018. Dr McNeil’s research focuses on the impact of human resource management practices on employee performance, wellbeing and experience of work. She has published in leading journals including the Journal of International Business Studies, the Journal of Business Ethics and the International Journal of HRM. Dr McNeil is a professional member of the Australian Institute of Human Resource Management. She is also an instructor for the Australian Consortium for Social and Political Research Inc. and offers courses on the use of computer-assisted qualitative data analysis and mixed methods research.