Kathleen Wilson

Dr Kathleen (Kathy) Wilson (PhD, MMgt, BA(HONS) is a Senior Lecturer in Management, Operations and Supply Chains at Swinburne University. Kathleen’s research contributions focus on digital transformation and innovation (NFTs, Metaverses, Virtual Worlds, Web 3.0), crowdsourcing/ crowd logistics, and women in sport. Since Feb 2020, Kathleen has filled the role of Deputy Department Chair, Dept Management & Marketing, SoBLE (over 60 staff in the department). This role also necessitates formally directly managing and motivating 6 Academic Tutors.

In November 2024, Kathleen, as lead author, published in J of Sport Management (ABDC - A) on important issues regarding promoting women to boards. In 2022 Kathleen, as lead author, produced a world-first non-fungible token (NFT) academic paper in Business Horizons Journal (Q1). Due to being a world-first academic paper on a contemporary digital innovation subject the paper has to date over 300 citations – placing it inside the top 1% of world’s most cited journal authors & in Business Horizon’s ‘Top 10 most downloaded articles’ for 8 months. It is also prominently cited in Wikipedia under 'NFT' entry. In addition, Kathleen produced a related Conversation article (almost 10,000 reads) and 2 commercial media podcasts.

In terms of digital innovation, Kathleen published a very early paper on the contemporary phenomenon of crowdsourcing in the International Journal of Operations & Production Management (A – ABDC) citations: 41. The data for this paper was from her PhD thesis (2015 - Uni of Melbourne) which has been downloaded over 9,400 times and attained first place on Uni of Melbourne FBE’s competitive ‘most cited thesis’ in 2017. Kathleen was invited to attend 3 prestigious Academy of Management Meetings and presented full papers. One conference paper has been cited 4 times. Kathleen has also presented full papers at 2 ANZAMs and 1 ANZAM SC SIG. Kathleen is passionate about women in sport and has published in European Sport Management Quarterly (Q1) 2022 as a contributing author. This paper has 32 citations and Kathleen contributed to a related Conversation article. Kathleen has supervised one PhD student – who submitted final thesis in May 2023.

Kathleen is an award-winning educator. She was awarded SoBLE Dean’s Excellence Award 2022 for authentic learning and teaching. She was also awarded an Australian "High Commendation" award 2022 for ‘Training, Education & Development’ by the national industry association at the Australia Supply Chain & Logistics Awards. Kathleen develops contemporary curriculum and authentic learning experiences co-created with industry partner Vic Gov. The student work is published on Vic Gov websites as a guide to real-world practitioners, and featured in the departmental Annual Report. 

Kathleen has had more than 20 years of work experience. She was formerly a Management Consultant at Pearson (PSON:LSE) in business development, tender projects, engagement, distributed workforces, innovation and strategy. Kathleen was also permanently appointed in a long-term role as senior Project/Stakeholder Manager, Program Manager and Foreign Investment Advisor in the Vic Department of Economic Development. She project managed a million-dollar + government project facilitating innovative collaboration and business development in Victoria's ICT industry. She was also an investment attraction, trade & business development specialist in the ICT and Biotechnology sectors and managed Ministerial International Trade Missions.

Other career highlights include that Kathleen was sworn-in as the first female Clerk of the Executive Council in Victoria’s 150 year history. In this role she managed Victoria's Executive Council and worked closely in an advisory capacity to the Governor of Victoria and Cabinet Ministers in relation to their statutory executive legal obligations. She also perfomed many top-level state ceremonial duties and swore in Ministers and Supreme Court Judges on behalf of the state. Kathleen also worked as Manager of Cabinet Operations and Secretary of the Budget Expenditure and Review Committee and Ministerial Industry Council. She also filled an advisory role to the Victorian Cabinet Secretary.

In previous roles Kathleen contract managed a Whole-of-Vic-Government $50M Teleco Calls contract with Telstra and Optus and was a tender and procurement specialist.

Earlier roles included professional Human Resources roles at Ford where she placed on the highly competitive Graduate Program and for ANZ Bank.

In 2010 Kathleen was awarded Most Outstanding Graduating Student and Dean’s Honor’s at Monash University for Master Business Management. She also was awarded a competitive Australian Government Postgraduate Award (APA) for excellence which subsidised her entire PhD studies.