Dr Outi Blackburn

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Lecturer in Management and Marketing, PhD (Business), DSc (Econ & BA), PGCert LTHE

Centre for Research into the Organization of Work and Consumption (CROWC) Centre for Intelligent Supply Chains

Faculty:
Faculty of Business and Law
School:
Management
Location:
Cambridge
Research Supervision:
Yes

I am a Lecturer in Management and Marketing at ARU, with extensive industry experience and a background in higher education teaching and research. Since 2020 I have been actively involved in university-level teaching, delivering undergaduate and postgraduate modules in marketing, management and business strategy, as well as supervising PhD students. My research focuses on the role of technologies in enabling sustainability transition within large-scale industrial systems.

Email: [email protected]

Background

Outi holds a Doctor of Science (Economics and Business Administration) from LUT University, Finland and a Doctor of Philosophy (Business) from RMIT, Australia. My doctoral research explored how digital platforms foster environmental and economic benefits in circular business models. She specialises in platforms as socio-technical systems, examining their role in sustainability, economic value creation and ethical business practices. Recently she has been studying the role of platforms in facilitating sustainability initiatives of large-scale industrial ecosystems, such as freeports in meeting the United Kingdom's ambitious Net Zero 2050 targets.

She has several years of international industry experience in various managerial and marketing roles, which she has applied to her teaching in higher education institutions in Finland and England. Her teaching spans multiple business disciplines, currently focusing on marketing, management, entrepreneurship, business strategy and sustainability.

She holds a Postgraduate Certificate in Leading and Teaching (Higher Education) and is an AdvanceHE certified external examiner.

Spoken Languages
  • Finnish (native)
  • Swedish (fair)
Research interests
  • Digital platforms and XR technologies
  • Circular Economy/Net Zero 2050
  • Sociotechnical systems
  • Resource-based view and sustained competitive advantage
Areas of research supervision
  • Undergraduate/Postgraduate Major Projects
  • PGR (PhD) students broadly in the fields of business and management
Teaching
  • Integrated Marketing Communications
  • Principles of Marketing Management
  • Undergraduate Major Project (Marketing)
  • Postgraduate Major Project (Entrepreneurial Action)
Qualifications
  • Doctor of Science (Economics and Business Administration), LUT University, Finland
  • Doctor of Philosophy (Business), Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Australia
  • PGCert LTHE
Memberships, editorial boards
  • Academy of Management (member)
  • European Academy of Management (member)
  • British Academy of Management (member)
Selected recent publications

Blackburn, O., Ritala, P., & Keränen, J., 2023. Digital Platforms for the Circular Economy: Exploring Meta-Organizational Orchestration Mechanisms. Organization & Environment, 36(2), 253–281. https://doi.org/10.1177/10860266221130717

Recent presentations and conferences

Blackburn, O., Ritala, P., Bocken, N., & Keränen J., 2023. Circular Economy Platforms: A Systematic Review. At the 2023 Miami Beach International Academic Conference on Business, Economics, Finance and Accounting