ProfessorColm McLaughlin

Colm McLaughlin is Professor of Employment Relations at the UCD School of Business. His academic signature lies at the interface between business and society, where his research, teaching and service collectively challenge narrow conceptions of managerial prerogative and profit maximisation and reposition the Business School as a site for critical engagement with ethics, sustainability, labour standards and societal responsibility.

His research is in comparative and institutional employment relations, with a particular focus on how power, legitimacy and ideas shape regulatory change and public policy outcomes relating to decent work and gender equality. His research has examined institutional change, collective bargaining, gender equality outcomes, training systems and low paid work.

His current research projects examine the just transition in textiles and food. He is part of the Horizon funded TRUSTex project (Advancing Sustainable Textiles in the Circular Economy through Innovative Extended Producer Responsibility Schemes) and the Irish Environmental Protection Aagency-funded JUSTICE project (JUSt Transition in Ireland’s Circular Economy: Scaling and Supporting Irish Food and Fashion Resource Recovery). He is also part of the Economic, Social and Policy Aspects Challenge of the SFI-funded Biorbic Centre at UCD.

In 2023/24 Colm was awarded a UCD University Teaching Excellence Award in recognition of his innovative teaching methods. He secured competitive SATLE funding to create and deliver a Business Sustainability and Climate Change module, based on the UNFCCC Paris Agreement and culminating in a two-day simulation, where students represent allocated countries and negotiate a “Dublin COP30”.  He also has an interest in case studies for teaching and has published articles on the case method. In 2017 he won the Best Paper Award from the Academy of Management Learning and Education Journal for his paper on the Harvard case method (with Todd Bridgman and Stephen Cummings, Victoria University of Wellington).

He is Vice-Principal for Equality, Diversity and Inclusion at the College of Business, Director of the UCD Centre for Business and Society (CeBaS) and the Director of the UN Principles for Responsible Management Education (PRME) for the College of Business. He is a Research Associate at the Centre for Business Research (CBR) at the University of Cambridge and has been a visiting fellow at the University of Cambridge, the University of Sydney, Victoria University Wellington and the University of Aalborg, Denmark. He is a graduate of the University of Auckland (BA and MComm) and holds a PhD from the University of Cambridge (Judge Business School and Darwin College). Prior to joining UCD Colm held an ESRC postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Cambridge and was a lecturer in Management and Employment Relations at the University of Auckland, and has held management positions in local government in London and the hospitality sector in New Zealand.