Dr Isaac Nana Akuffo
Lecturer of Management
School of Business
Isaac is a lecturer of management and holds a PhD in management. He loves research and teaching. He has been teaching in higher education for over ten years. He has teaching experience in different countries such as the UK, China, Estonia, and Ghana. He has published in different ranked journals.
Isaac is a faculty member in our School of Management. He teaches strategic business futures, international strategic management, and sustainable management and ethics. He is also the module leader for the strategic business futures co-run with CEG. He also supervises master's and doctoral students. Currently, he is supervising five doctoral students as the lead supervisor with three master’s students. He has published in different ranked journals. These have included the Management Research Review journal (2019 and 2021), the Sustainability Journal (2020), International Journal of Social Economics (2020), and International Journal of Applied Decision Sciences (2021). He has also published chapters with Springer Nature.
Isaac’s teaching in higher education began in 2013 in Ghana at Knutsford University College. Isaac also gained some administrative experience. This was by assisting as well as managing the students’ affairs department of the university. He gained a scholarship for his PhD studies at the University of Tartu, Estonia in 2016. While pursuing his PhD he had a full-time position as a junior research fellow in management and later as a lecturer after his PhD until 2022.
He has also worked as an adjunct lecturer. This has been in other higher education institutions such as Shanghai University – China and Estonia Aviation Academy – Estonia. In these four universities, Isaac taught and led modules like innovation management, strategic management, basics of innovation, entrepreneurship, management skills, principles of management and organisational behaviour at both master’s and bachelor’s levels. He also served on different committees such as the admission and research defence at the University of Tartu.
Isaac joined us in July 2022 as a lecturer of management. He has research experience dating back to 2007 when he wrote his bachelor’s dissertation. After his master’s education, he had the opportunity to engage in some research with PWC, Ghana, and German Development Cooperation (GIZ – Ghana). He has research interests in leadership, strategic and innovation management, ethics, internationalisation of firms, and work behaviours. He has published and reviewed for different journals in the field of business.
Finally, Isaac holds a Ph.D. in management from the University of Tartu. He has also presented at international conferences such as the 14th European Conference on Management Leadership and Governance (Netherlands) and Estonian Economic Association (EMS) 14th Annual Conference (Estonia).
- Ph.D. in Management, University of Tartu, 2020
- MPhil in Industrial and Organisational Psychology, University of Ghana, 2010
- Bachelor of Arts (BA) Psychology, University of Ghana, 2007
- Leadership
- Strategic and innovation management
- Ethics
- Internationalisation of firms
- Work behaviours
Isaac's research focuses on how ethical, strategic, and collective leadership behaviour influences organisations. Especially in terms of implementing measures that will help the organisation to become efficient and effective. Similarly, he is interested in how leaders of organisations strategise and adapt to trends in the business environment to survive the turbulent business environment.
He is also interested in how ethical leaders inculcate ethics into their employees to minimise corruption and unethical behaviours which can affect employees’ work behaviours either positively or negatively. Finally, he's interested in the processes multinational firms undergo. This is before expanding their activities to different countries and why firms in developing economies struggle to expand to developed economies.
Sample publications
- Akuffo, I. N and Kivipõld, K. (2019). Influence of leaders’ authentic competences on nepotism-favouritism and cronyism, Management Research Review, 43(4), 369–386.
- Coudounaris, D. N., Akuffo, I. N., and Nkulenu, A. (2020). Human resource management for Ghanaian nurses: Job satisfaction versus turnover intentions, Sustainability, 12(17), 7117.
- Ashyrov, G and Akuffo, I. N. (2020). Dimension of corruption and firm performance: an empirical analysis from BEEPS survey, International Journal of Social Economics, 47(3), 384–403.
- Meerits, A., Kivipõld, K. and Akuffo, I.N. (2021). Possibilities for assessing Authentic Leadership competencies: Testing existing instruments and proposing an extended one, Management Research Review, 45(6), 801-823.
Use the links below to view their profiles:
- Influence of managers’ authentic behaviour on nepotism-favouritism and cronyism. 14th European Conference on Management Leadership and Governance. Ed. Dr. Ing. Benny M.E. de Waal and Prof. dr. Pascal Ravesteijn. United Kingdom: Academic Conferences and Publishing International. Venue: HU University of Applied Sciences, 18–19 October 2018 Utrecht, Netherlands.
- Estonian Economic Association (EMS) 14th Annual Conference Information. Theme of conference was “Controversies of Economic Theory and Policy”. Title of presentation “Types matter: corruption and firm productivity”.Venue: Pühajärve SPA and Holiday Resort on January 31 – February 1, 2019.
- PhD Summer School in Economics, Management, Political Science, Law and Public Administration Doctoral School in Economics and Innovation. Title of presentation “Authentic leadership competences and positional favouritism: impact on positive and negative organizational effectiveness”. Venue: Laulasmaa, June 26–28, 2019.
- The 61st IMTA Conference Tallinn, Estonia. Theme “better leaders through military psychology-methods, challenges, and success stories”. Title of presentation “Development of AL extended model”. October 7th to 11th, 2019.
Email: Email:Dr Isaac Nana Akuffo
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