The ageing and elder care research group is a multidisciplinary research group (incl. social gerontology, gerontological social work, health and social management, organization sciences), which addresses various elder care management and organizational issues and the wellbeing of older people from multi-agency perspectives. The effectiveness of services is also studied with different methodical approaches.
Albert Mills (albert.mills@uef.fi)
Albert’s research interests include gender discrimination at work; intersectionality and diversity management; management history; and existentialism and management theory. He is the author and editor of over 150 scholarly articles; 100 book chapters and 50 books. He is the co-developer of Critical Sensemaking and ANTi-History and played an important role in the development of the field of gender and organizational theory. Albert is currently the Co-Chair of the international Critical Management Studies organization and has previously served as President of the Atlantic Schools of Business; President of the Administrative Sciences Association of Canada; Divisional Co-Chair of the Critical Management Studies division of the Academy of Management; and board member of the International Federation of Scholarly Associations of Management and of the Standing Conference on Organizational Symbolism. He is the Co-editor of the international journal Qualitative Research in Organizations and Management and serves on the editorial board of several leading journals. He has supervised 30 plus doctoral students in Canada and Finland. Albert’s association with Finland began in 1996 when he co-taught an international course on gender, culture and management at Lappeenranta University; taught doctoral courses at Hanken University and at the UEF since 2011. He has also been involved in several Canadian and Finnish-funded research to the tune of CAN$12 million.
Andrew Agbaje (andrew.agbaje@uef.fi)
Prof. Agbaje is an award-winning physician and professor (associate) of clinical epidemiology and child health who currently investigates causal relationships of aerobic fitness, physical activity, sedentary behaviour, body composition, insulin resistance, dyslipidaemia, and metabolic syndrome with arterial, cardiac, liver, and kidney structure and function from childhood through young adulthood.
He discovered arterial stiffness as a novel risk factor for paediatric obesity and insulin resistance, identified adolescence as the critical time to interrupt fat mass-insulin resistance pathologic cycle, and demonstrated light-intensity physical activity as a highly effective antidote for reversing excessive fat deposit induced by childhood sedentariness. Recently, he discovered waist-to-height ratio as a specific surrogate for fat mass but not muscle mass that could replace BMI in assessing childhood obesity. Subsequently, he was interviewed LIVE on BBC World News TV to discuss the novel findings.
As of September/October 2023, two of Prof. Agbaje’s publications were placed in the Top 1% highly cited paper in the academic field of Clinical Medicine, while a third publication was placed in the Top 1% highly cited paper in the academic field of Biology & Biochemistry by Clarivate’s Web of Science.
He has a first authored paper in Nature Communications and was interviewed LIVE on BBC World Service Radio Newsday programme on 15th Dec 2023, BBC Radio Devon on 16th Jan 2024, and BBC World News LIVE TV programme on 14th March 2024. The University of Eastern Finland recently recorded a podcast interview of his latest findings as well as a video.
The Endocrine Society in US, recently recorded a podcast interview of his research and discussed his research in the prestigious Endocrine Magazine March 2024 edition. He was recently interviewed by the European Association for the Study of Obesity, a federation of 36 European countries’ professional associations.
His research has received extensive press coverage, with over 2,000 media mentions in 2022 and 2023 in outlets such as BBC, CNN, The Telegraph, Daily Mail, Mirror, BILD, Infobae, Yahoo Lifestyle, Yahoo Sport, US News & World report, DocCheck, MSN, WebMD, Medscape, The Conversation, Jerusalem Post, Helsingin Sanomat, etc, potentially reaching a global audience of more than 4.5 billion. The equivalent advertising value of these news articles is more than 30 million US dollars.
He is the principal investigator of the urFIT-child research group and has strong collaboration with world-renowned pediatricians, exercise physiologists, epidemiologists, and adult clinicians in Canada, US, UK, Germany, Australia, Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, etc.
He has received several scientific excellence awards including the prestigious EASO-Novo Nordisk Foundation for New Investigator Award in Childhood Obesity with a 300,000 Danish Kroner (~40,000 euro) prize. Other awards are the American Heart Association’s Elizabeth Barrett-Connor Research Award in Epidemiology and Prevention (once), Jeremiah and Rose Stamler Research Award (twice), and Paul Dudley White International Scholar Award (thrice).
He co-authored an American Heart Association Scientific Statement on Environmental Exposures and Pediatric Cardiology, published in Circulation. He had a video discussion of the Scientific Statement. He was an invited guest speaker to the largest mother and child center in Canada – CHU Sainte-Justine Mother and Child University Hospital Center, Canada in March 2023 to speak on the determinants of carotid intima-media thickness and arterial stiffness in pediatrics.
He is an Honorary Research Fellow at the Children’s Health and Exercise Research Centre (CHERC), Department of Public Health and Sports Sciences, Faculty of Health and Life Sciences, University of Exeter, Exeter, UK.
He was recently appointed an Associate Editor in the Journal of Cachexia, Sarcopenia, and Muscle (JCSM). He serves on the editorial board of Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis, and Vascular Biology (ATVB), and mentors early career editorial board members. He also serves on the editorial board of Pediatric Exercise Science journal.
He is an elected Fellow of the European Society of Cardiology (FESC) and an elected Fellow of the American Heart Association (FAHA). These titles of honour, symbol of excellence and lifetime achievement recognizes his significant contribution to cardiovascular field in Europe and America.
He is an expert advisor to the World Health Organization’s task force on preventing childhood obesity.
Primary email is andrew.agbaje@uef.fi
Secondary email is a.agbaje@exeter.ac.uk
Annalisa Savaresi (annalisa.savaresi@uef.fi)
Annalisa Savaresi is an environmental law expert with a 20-year track record working alongside international and non-governmental organizations.
Annalisa’s academic portfolio comprises more than 50 peer-reviewed articles and contributions to well-regarded collections, enjoying widespread citations, including by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
In addition to her academic work, Annalisa serves as the Director for Europe within the Global Network on Human Rights and the Environment. She also holds the role of Associate Editor at the Review of European, Comparative, and International Law and is a member of the IUCN World Commission on Environmental Law.
Annalisa is actively engaged in providing evidence to legislative bodies, including the UK, EU, and Scottish Parliaments. She further sits on the Board of Environmental Standards Scotland, a body established under the UK Withdrawal from the European Union (Continuity) (Scotland) Act 2021, which oversees the compliance of Scottish public authorities with environmental law.
Anu Puusa (anu.puusa@uef.fi)
I work as a Professor in Management. My current research interest areas are co-operatives, work-community skills/Organization Citizenship behaviour, organizational identity and change. I have published textbooks and numerous journal articles and other publications.
I also believe in giving back: I have positions of trust such as membership of the board at Cooperatives Europe and Pellervo Coop Center (I am bit of a co-operative enthusiastic).
I am experienced organizational speaker and an awarded teacher. I am an academic who does not believe that theory and practice are opposites. My philosophical background lies in the interpretative paradigm: “We look at the same target, but do we see the same thing?”
I am a realist who tend to look at the bright side of life. I believe in the power of questions. Joint pondering and cooperation are the ways forward.
Binod Kafle (binod.kafle@uef.fi)
Binod Kafle holds an M.Sc. in Wood Materials Science from the University of Eastern Finland (2021-2023) and an M.Sc. in Agriculture Extension (2005-2007) from the Institute of Agriculture and Animal Science (IAAS), Tribhuvan University (TU), Nepal. With a diverse professional background, Binod has worked as a Project Coordinator, Agricultural Scientist, Social Development Specialist, and in Customer Service in various organizations in Nepal, Denmark, and Finland during 2006 to 2023. His research focuses on agriculture and wood materials, including studies on the adoption and diffusion of organic vegetables, improved maize varieties, improved potato varieties, the development of agro-technologies for livelihood enhancement, and the growth of fungi on wood biochar. He has authored several publications on topics such as socio-economic assessments of improved maize varieties, the adoption of improved potato varieties, the diffusion of early rice varieties, and organic vegetable farming.
Caterina Bettin (caterina.bettin@uef.fi)
My research focuses on subjectivity, relationalism and the existential questions that underpin these constructs. I am interested in affect and emotional intensity and how they shape organizational dynamics. I am also interested in power and democracy in the workplace.
Currently, I am researching patient engagement, involvement and participation in health research.
Data Literacy for Responsible Decision-Making (DATALIT)
The project investigates use of data as well as development and use of new tools for data-based decision-making in social and healthcare public organizations. The project examines current practices and development projects, as well as their institutional and societal implications and impacts. One of the starting points is to study and evaluate especially the possibilities of using tools and models, which are not based on profiling individuals. A central goal is to identify criteria for socially sustainable uses of data rather than provision of a list of general ethical principles.
The project is a part of DataLit consortium coordinated by the University of Helsinki. The multidisciplinary consortium combines social sciences, law and computer science. The aim of the project is to develop understandable and reliable practices and tools, which can utilise Finnish social, healthcare and well-being data and promote data literacy.
Funded by: Strategic Research Council 10/2020-9/2023
Esa Hiltunen (esa.hiltunen@uef.fi)
I work as a Senior Lecturer in Innovation Management at UEF Business School and I am an expert of organizational change in the health sector. Another research interest focuses on retail sector and participatory innovation. I also supervise theses in master and doctoral programs.
I have a special competence in qualitative research in organizations, particularly observation-based ethnography, which I have applied in research that is based on Bourdieu’s field theory. I have a wide collaboration network in different research fields, both business studies and sociology.
Hanna Lehtimäki (hanna.lehtimaki@uef.fi)
Hanna Lehtimäki (Ph.D. Bus Econ) is a professor of Innovation Management in Business School and a Director of Research Center for Sustainable Circular Economy (CECE) at the University of Eastern Finland. Her research examines circular economy with theoretical frameworks on innovation management, strategic management, organization theory, leadership, and entrepreneurship. She and her research team, SunLab, advance transdisciplinary social sciences research and societal impact in sustainable circular economy transition. In her capacity as a Vice Director of UEF strategic research community Sustainable Resource Society: Circular Economy, Energy and Raw Materials (RESOURCE RC), she advances multidisciplinary social sciences research agenda for sustainability transition in business and society. Her research has appeared in journals internationally and she has recently co-edited books on art and sustainability and catalyzing sustainable circular economy.
She leads a Finnish Indian research consortium Circular Economy Solutions for Microplastics: Indo-Finnish Scientific Collaboration for Innovation (CESMI). She also leads a research project Leading Regenerative Circular Economy (LEADSUS) funded by the Finnish Foundation for Economic Education and is a work package leader in Academy of Finland funded research project Multi-level governance of critical materials for future electric mobility (GOVERMAT). She was a vicePI and a work package leader in an Academy of Finland Strategic Research Council project Circular Economy Catalysts: From Innovation to Business Ecosystems (2019-2023).
She is the leader of Sustainability leadership international Master’s programme at the UEF Business School and a multidisciplinary minor Sustainable Business and Society.