Professor Kiran Trehan

Professor Kiran Trehan

Department of Management
Professor of Leadership and Enterprise Development
Director of the Centre for Women’s Enterprise, Leadership, Economy & Diversity (WE LEAD)
Director of Business Engagement

Contact details

Telephone
+44 (0)121 415 8244
Fax
+44 (0) 121 414 2982
Email
k.trehan@bham.ac.uk
Twitter
@ProfKTrehan
View my research portal
Address
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 2TT
UK

Kiran Trehan is Professor of Leadership and Enterprise Development at Birmingham Business School at the University of Birmingham. She is also Director of the Centre for Women’s Enterprise, Leadership, Economy & Diversity (WE LEAD), Director of Business Engagement and Head of subject group Entrepreneurship and Local Economy.

Qualifications

  • PhD University of Lancaster
  • MA in Management Learning, University of Lancaster
  • BA (Hons) Sociology with Professional Studies

Biography

UNFILTERED: Why do we need more female CEOs?

Kiran Trehan is Director of the Centre for Women’s Enterprise, Leadership, Economy & Diversity, Director of Business Engagement, and head of subject group Entrepreneurship and Local Economy at Birmingham University. Kiran is a key contributor to debates on leadership, enterprise development and diversity in business. Kiran has led a number of leaderships, enterprise and business support initiatives and extensively published a number of journal articles, policy reports, books and book chapters in the field. Professor Trehan’ s work has been supported by grants from a full range of research funding bodies; including the Economic and Social Research Councils and Arts Humanities Research councils, government departments, regional and local agencies and the private sector. Professor Trehan has also taken up national advisory roles that shape debates and policy on leadership, inclusivity and diversity. She is Vice President at the Institute for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (ISBE).

Kiran is currently leading a major piece of research on leadership inclusivity as part of Andy Street’s Mayoral Leadership Commission in the West Midlands and was recently awarded the Diversity and Inclusion Leadership Award for championing leadership inclusivity by Business Desk.

Teaching

  • MSc HRM Leadership development
  • MBA
  • PhD 

Research

Kiran's key interests are in the field of enterprise and leadership development and critical action learning. Her research involves the active engagement of policy makers and practitioners on issues relating to diversity, enterprise and leadership development. Her work has focused on the dynamics of enterprise and leadership development in large and small firms. Kiran is a leading contributor to debates on the distinctiveness of critical action learning, and how it can be applied in a variety of organisational and policy domains. Her publications in Management Learning (2003, 2010), Gender & Education, (2001) Studies in Higher Education (2001) and Journal of Action Learning: Research and Practice (2004, 2008, 2009) are testimony both to the growing importance of this mode of research, and her success in advancing action learning in different contexts, ranging from management school classrooms to networks of ethnic minority businesses and policy-making circles. In addition Kiran has a strong track record of attracting funding, mostly for her research in enterprise development in ethnic minority small firm from research councils (ESRC) and regional development agencies, which has led to high quality research outputs. Central to this is a concern with ‘impact’ and collaborative working with user groups.

Selected Research Grants

April 2012-April 2013 Economic Social and Research Council 

Facilitating Impact: Entrepreneurship and Diversity with Professor M Ram  

January 2011-December 2011 Economic Social and Research Council

Facilitating Impact: Entrepreneurship and Diversity:   Joint Applicant with Professor M Ram

April 2007-March 2008 Economic Social and Research Council 

Facilitating Entrepreneurial Regeneration: A Collaborative Approach to African-Caribbean Business

Development, with Professor M Ram

April 2007-March 2008, Economic Social and Research Council 

Facilitating Entrepreneurial Regeneration: A Collaborative Approach to Bangladeshi Business

Development with Professor M Ram

Other activities

  • Co- Editor Action Learning: Research & Practice - The first international journal dedicated to the advancement of knowledge and practice through action learning. To receive contents alerts for every new issue, please visit http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/titles/14767333.asp
  • Visting Research Fellow Lancacaster University Mangement School
  • Visiting Professor, Faculty of Business and Management. Chester University

Publications

Books

Rigg, C, Trehan, K, Stewart, J (eds) (2006). ‘Beyond Critical Human Resource Development’ Pearsons London

Book Chapters

Trehan, K, and Rigg, C. (2014) Critical action learning; research; Opportunities and challenges for HRD research in  Critical qualitative research; Edited by Mark Saunders and Paul Tosey 

Trehan, K , Rigg, C (2012) HRD and Consultancy J.P.Wilson (Ed) International Human Resource Development: Learning, Education and Training for Individuals and organization 3rd Edition Kogan Page London

Trehan, K (2011) Critical Action Learning - From theory to practice in M Pedler (ed) Action Learning in Practice, 4th Edition, Gower Publishing

Rigg, C, Trehan, (2011) Action Learning in Encyclopaedia of the Sciences of Learning, Springer Publishing

Trehan, K and Pedler, M (2009) Critical Action Learning; “Putting an edge on leadership & management development”. Chapter in R Mumford, J Gold and R Thorpe (eds) The Handbook of Leadership and Management Development. Gower Publishing

Trehan, K and Rigg, C (2007) ‘Working with Experiential Learning’. Chapter in Vince, R and Reynolds, M (ed) Experiential Learning. Oxford University Press, Oxford

Trehan, K, Rigg, C and Stewart, J (2006) ‘Going Beyond a Critical Turn: Limitations and Hypocrisies’, Chapter in C Rigg, J Stewart, and K Trehan (eds) Beyond Critical HRD. Pearsons, London

Trehan, K, Shelton, R (2006) ‘Leadership Development, a critical examination’. Chapter in R Hill and J Stewart (eds) Management Development: Perspectives from Research and Practice. Routledge, London

Trehan, K and Rigg. C (2005) ‘Beware of the Unbottled Genie: Unspoken Aspects of Critical Self-reflection’. Chapter in C Elliot and S Turnbull (eds) Critical Thinking in HRD. Routledge, London

Rigg, C and Trehan, K (2004) ‘Now you see it, now you don’t: a discourse perspective on researching HRD in SMEs’. Chapter in J Stewart and G Beaver (eds) HRD in Small Organisations. Routledge, London

Trehan, K and Rigg, C (2003) ‘Propositions for Incorporating a Pedagogy of Complexity, Emotion and Power in HRD Education’. Chapter in M Lee (ed) HRD in a Complex World. Routledge, London

Trehan, K and Reynolds, M  (2002) ‘Assessment, the Online Experience’.  Chapter in C Steeples and C Jones (eds) Networked Learning, Perspectives and Issues. Springer-Verlag, London

Rigg, C, Ram, M, Trehan, K, (2001) ‘Using Action Research to Explore the Development Needs of Second Generation Asian Small Businesses’. Chapter in J McGoldrick, J Stewart and T. Watson (eds) Researching HRD. Routledge, London

Trehan, K and Rigg, C (1999) ‘Changing Management and Employment in Local Government’. Chapter in K Isaac-Henry, C Painter and C Barnes (eds) Managing in the Public Sector: Challenge and Change 2nd Edition. International Thompson Business Press, London

Refereed Journal Articles

Carter, S; M Ram; K Trehan and T Jones. 2014. "Diversity and SMEs: Existing Evidence and Policy Tensions," Enterprise Research Centre, White Paper 1. 

Ram, M , Trehan, K, Rouse, J, Woldesenbet, K, Jones (2012) Ethnic Minority  Business support in the west Midlands : Challenges and Developments 'Government and Policy (Environment and Planning C).

Trehan, K and Rigg, C (2011) Theorising Critical HRD; Complexities and contradictions. Journal of European Industrial Training vol: 35 (3) pg: 276 Emerald highly commended paper award

Ram, M and Trehan, K (2010). Critical Action Learning, Policy Learning and Small Firms: An Inquiry. Management Learning Vol 41(4) 415–428

Ram, M and Trehan, K (2009). Critical by Design; Enacting Critical Action Learning in Small Business Context.  Journal of Action Learning Research and Practice, Vol 6 (3), pp 305-318

Trehan, K, and Pedler, M (2009). Animating critical action learning: Process based leadership & management development. Journal of Action Learning Research and Practice, Vol 6 (1), pp 35-49

Trehan, K and Rigg, C (2008). Critical Reflection in the Workplace - Is it just too Difficult? Journal of European Industrial Training, Vol 31 (2), pp 219-237

Trehan, K (2007). Exploring the relationship between critical HRD and psychodynamic approaches to development. Journal of Advances in Developing Human Resources, Vol 9 (1), pp 73-82

Trehan, K (2006). Making diversity count: from resistance to learning. Public Services Review: Central Government, Issue 11, pp 60-66

Trehan, K (2005). Unravelling Diversity, Public Services Review: Central Government, Issue 10, pp 80-86

Trehan, K (2004). Who’s sleeping with whom? What’s not being talked about in HRD. Journal of European Industrial Training, Vol 28 (1), pp. 23-38.  Highly commended paper award

Trehan, K and Rigg, C (2004). Reflections on Working with Critical Action Learning. Journal of Action Learning, Vol 1 (2), pp 51-67

Reynolds, M and Trehan, K (2003). Learning from difference: A critical perspective. Management Learning, Vol 31 (2), pp 163 – 180

Rigg, C and Trehan, K (2002). “Do they or don’t they?”: A comparison of traditional and discourse perspectives of HRD in SMEs. Education and Training, Vol 44 (89), pp 338-397

Reynolds, M and Trehan, K (2001). Classroom as Real World: Propositions for a Pedagogy of Difference. Gender and Education, Vol 13 (4), pp 357-372

Reynolds, M and Trehan, K (2000). Assessment: A Critical Perspective. Studies in Higher Education, Vol 25 (3), pp 267-278

Rigg, C and Trehan, K (1999). “Not Critical Enough?” Black women raise challenges for critical management learning. Gender and Education, Vol 11 (3), pp 265-280

View all publications in research portal

Expertise

A specialist in entrepreneurship, small firms and diversity. Professor Trehan is a key contributor to debates on diversity, and enterprise development in small firms. She is also an expert on SMEs who are reliant on European trade.

Expertise

Kiran is a specialist in entrepreneurship, small firms and diversity.