Postgraduate Research: Blessing Wins the PhD Diversity and Inclusion Scholarship
Blessing Chukwuka is a PhD candidate in Management, from Nigeria, and received the Diversity and Inclusion Scholarship in October 2021.
Blessing Chukwuka is in her first year of studying a PhD in Management at the School. Having studied Sociology for her undergraduate and Master’s degrees at the University of Ibadan, Nigeria, Blessing chose QMS for her PhD studies due to its reputation for high impact, globally recognised research and to enable her to gain globally competitive research skills.
Blessing is researching a largely undertheorized concept within management literature - the maternal body experience and its relationship within an organisation. Due to the themes of her research, Blessing received the Diversity and Inclusion Scholarship in October 2021 under the supervision of Dr. Denise Currie and Dr. Heike Schroder.
The PhD Scholarship in Diversity and Inclusion was introduced to complement and build upon the School's existing expertise and interests in Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI), Work and Employment and HRM
Blessing's application stood out because of the quality of the proposal's discussion and research design. Not only has this PhD the potential to develop new theoretical insights into EDI issues drawing from Embodiment Theory but, drawing from institutional logics theory, it is also furthering our understanding of how these issues are experienced in the often-overlooked context of the Global South. Over and above the research proposal, Blessing's strong sense of purpose and motivation for embarking on this PhD catapulted her above the competition for this scholarship.
We interviewed Blessing to learn more about her fascinating research, and her experience at the School.
Tell us about your research?
My research focuses on the lived experiences of the maternal body; where the pregnant and nursing bodies of women are viewed as taboo and unsuitable in the world of work. I am employing institutional logics framework to interpret the peculiarities of maternal body experiences within the institution.
There are substantial claims that there is a conflict of interest between the maternal body and the workers body, hence the institutional logics theory further calls for the recognition of conflicting logics between maternal body and work and how this conflict can be resolved.
How will your research be beneficial to the world of business?
The discourse around equality, diversity and inclusion in the world of business cannot be overemphasized. This study offers potential contributions to modern organisations on how they can accommodate the embodied self.
Practically, the findings of this study will highlight the need for organisations to evaluate practices and policies around the maternal body and the implications this has for women.
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