Dr Maria Balta

Dr Maria Elisavet Balta is currently Senior Lecturer in Human Resource Management and Departmental Research and Innovation Lead.

She holds a PhD in Management Studies funded by Leventis Foundation and MSc in Human Resources and Employment Relations both from Brunel University London. She is Senior Fellow of Higher Education Academy and Academic Member of CIPD.

Over the years, Maria held several leadership roles within the school, including Director of the MSc in Human Resource Management, TEF Coordinator and Chief Examiner.

Her research has received a significant amount of funding from national and international research council organisations including ESRC (2024 – 2027) – Building resilience: How conservation agriculture can help smallholder women farmers adapt to climate change (£718,125,000) (CI), Innovate UK (2024) – Developing a set of leadership guidelines for the successful adoption and implementation of Human Resource Information Systems (HRIS) (£20,949.67) (PI), British Academy of Management Transition Grant 2 (2022), on Business Model pivoting and digital technologies’ use among start-ups in turbulent environments (£3,200,00) (PI), Medway Council in partnership with Local Government Association (LGA) and University College London (UCL) (£30,000,00) (CI), Medway Council Strategic Recovery Fund (£17,500,00) (PI), UKAIS (£1,000,00) (CI), the Qatar ($796,000,00) (CI), KTP (10,000,00) (CI), European Commission for the ERASMUS+ 2015 (€207.526,00)(CI), Brunel Research Initiative & Enterprise Fund (£12,574,00) (PI). 

Maria is recipient of the Graduate and Researcher College Prize for Programme Academic Lead from the University of Kent in 2023, and she was nominated for the Brilliant Research-Based Education Award by the Kent Union, University of Kent in May 2023. 

Maria Balta discusses her research into the role of digital technologies into business model pivoting, human resource management systems, climate change and leadership styles in supply chain management, aiming to develop organisational resilience and effective crisis response strategies.

Maria’s work appears in internationally recognised peer-reviewed outlets including:

• British Journal of Management
• Work Employment and Society
• Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review
• Technological Forecasting and Social Change
• International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behaviour and Research
• International Journal of Information Management
• European Management Review
• Journal of Information Frontiers
• Production Planning and Control and Organization

Maria has significant experience in designing and delivering modules at undergraduate, postgraduate and MBA levels. 

In 2022-23, she convenes the following modules:

• BUSN 9000 Sustainability and Corporate Responsibility
• BUSN 9201 Research Methods and Consulting Skills
• BUSN 8103 Human Resource Management in Context

Dr Balta welcomes applications relative to her research expertise. If you are interested in a PhD in her research area, please contact Maria directly.

Current Supervisees

• Jane Adamson: Exploring the role of human agency within organisational change – what approaches can leaders take to identify and influence human agency during organisational change programmes (2nd supervisor).
• Maryam Ajaj: Entrepreneurship Self-Efficacy (ESE) and its effects on entrepreneurship opportunities (2nd supervisor).

Past Supervisees

• Idorenyin Etokakpan: Talent Management-Post Brexit: Employer Branding as Strategic tool for Employee Retention.

• Nasser Alshawaaf: The Interrelationship Between Micro-Level Mechanisms in the Emergence of Hybrid Institutional Logics: A Comparative Analysis of Art Museums in the United Kingdom and France

• Bader Aldawaidh: Investigating the relationship between top management team’s characteristics and organisational innovation: The Mediating role of dynamic capabilities

• Zafer N. Aljalfan: Investigating strategic alignment of talent management and organisation sustainability in Higher Education

• Behrouz Behzadan: The Mechanism and Process of Succession in Industrial Family Businesses: Case Studies in the Iranian Context

• Qamra Alomani: The mediating role of emotional exhaustion and work engagement on the relationship between job demands-resources and nurses’ anxiety, turnover intention and happiness in Saudi public hospitals

• Mohd Huridi: The impact of globalisation on the SMEs export performance

• Che Rosmawati Binti Che Mat: The mediating and moderating effect of innovation and dynamics capabilities on the relationship between business network and firm’s performance of Malaysian SMEs

• Jaehoon Lim: A Transition process from Acceptance to Infusion behaviour in online brand communities: A socialization process perspective

• Akarawat Jatuphatwarodom: Exporter-importer relationships and international marketing strategies: An empirical study on ASEAN Economic Community
  

• Senior Fellow of the Higher EducationAcademy
• Academic Member of CIPD
• Member of British Academy of Management
• External examiner for PhD/DBA: Kings College London, Brunel University, Bradford University.
• External examiner for Programmes: Swansea University, Henley Business School.