Professor Sarah Drakopoulou Dodd
Hunter Centre for Entrepreneurship, Strategy and Innovation
Personal statement
Sarah's research focuses on the impact of socio-cultural factors on the nature, quality and quantity of entrepreneurship, including socio-economic marginality, social ties, religion, politics, and the family. She has a special interest in alternative, or inclusive, small business start-up and growth, including punk rock, craft beer, and social innovation. Sarah has also studied social capital and networking, growth strategies, family business, entrepreneurship education, and cross-cultural conceptualizations of the entrepreneur. An additional research stream includes the relationships between theology, religion and entrepreneurship. Sarah's research has been published in leading entrepreneurship and management journals, including the Journal of Business Venturing, Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, Management Decision, the Scandinavian Journal of Management, Entrepreneurship and Regional Development, the International Small Business Journal, the Family Business Review, and the International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Innovation.
Sarah teaches and trains in the areas of entrepreneurship and society, corporate venturing, new venture creation and growth, family business, organizational behaviour, and international business management. She also teaches qualitative methods to graduate students.
Professor Dodd’s previous posts include Professor of Enterprise and Small Business at Middlesex University, and academic positions with ALBA Graduate School of Business (Athens, Greece), the American College of Greece, Robert Gordon University (Aberdeen), and the University of Aberdeen. She holds a visiting positions at the University of Lancaster.
Professor. Dodd has considerable experience of marketing, training, and business development, including several years spent managing Aberdeen University's executive development programmes for areas ranging from engineering to philosophy, and from forestry to management. Professor Dodd also founded and directed AHEAD, the Alba Hub for Enterprise and Development, Greece’s first University centre for entrepreneurship, which bridges the gap between the worlds of higher education and enterprise.
Current engagement and research projects include Transforming Entrepreneurship Education, The Ink Way (writing and walking workshops), and Every Tree Tells a Story.
Area of Expertise
Sarah has 25 years of hands-on work training, developing and supporting entrepreneurs in a range of international settings. Prior to her academic career, Sarah developed considerable practical experience working in marketing, training, and business development. This included several years spent managing all of Aberdeen University's executive development programmes for areas ranging from engineering to philosophy, and from forestry to management. In this role, and in others since, she has worked with a broad variety of private and public sector organisations, including high tech start-ups, community businesses, large corporations and local governments.
Sarah has a special interest in working with small, independent ventures that focus on a social, or creative mission. Recent research and engagement projects are in the world of craft beer, of punk rock, and of civic place making (urban forestry, active scholarship).
Publications
- (Two) wheels on the bus : road user perceptions of a bike bus and how this links to addressing global health challenges
- Harrington Deirdre M, Bardid Farid, Cory Katherine, Dixon James, Dodd Sarah, Ferguson Neil, Roberts Jennifer J, Bonner James
- Journal of Physical Activity and Health Vol 21, pp. 1382-1390 (2024)
- https://doi.org/10.1123/jpah.2024-0219
- The other organization : heterotopia, management, and entrepreneurship
- Champenois Claire, Drakopoulou Dodd Sarah, Hjorth Daniel, Jack Sarah
- Journal of Management Inquiry (2024)
- https://doi.org/10.1177/10564926241281080
- "Let them not make me a stone" - repositioning entrepreneurship
- Dodd Sarah, Anderson Alistair, Jack Sarah
- Journal of Small Business Management Vol 61, pp. 1842-1870 (2023)
- https://doi.org/10.1080/00472778.2020.1867734
- On the beer wagon : the past, present and future of Celtic Craft Brewing and its policies
- Wilson Juliette, Sanchez Rodrigues Vasco, Mac an Bhaird Ciaran, Lofti Maryam, Kumar Maneesh, Horgan Donagh, Drakopoulou Dodd Sarah, Danson Mike
- Regional Studies, Regional Science (2022)
- Re-sourcing the city through radical institutional enterprise entwining and embedding the rural in urban peripheries
- Drakopoulou Dodd Sarah, Wilson Juliette, Bonner James
- Institute for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (2022)
- Community engagement for social and environmental innovation : a Sicilian case study
- Evans Brendan, Wilson Juliette, Drakopoulou Dodd Sarah, Alexander Matthew
- Institute for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (2022)
Teaching
Sarah is committed to creating new, relevant knowledge about the entrepreneurial process, and sharing this in a highly practical fashion with students, entrepreneurs and policy makers. She believes that we learn best through guided experiences, and through coached interactions with our peers, and this is reflected in her interactive teaching style. Sarah founded and directed AHEAD, Greece’s first University centre for entrepreneurship, bridging the gap between the worlds of higher education and enterprise. She served as a long-time member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Greek Entrepreneurs Association.
Sarah has more than 25 years of experience in the teaching and training of new venture creation and growth, and family business. She also teaches in the area of embedding and encouraging entrepreneurship within larger organizations, including corporate venturing, entrepreneurial management and leadership. Sarah has also taught qualitative methodologies, most especially metaphor methods, to a range of PhD students around Europe. Her teaching portfolio includes organizational behaviour, and international business management.
Professional Activities
- Cycling for Regeneration Workshop - The Kirkpatrick Cycle Route
- Organiser
- 29/4/2024
- “Every Tree Tells a Story: Gathering and sharing stories of the social-ecological value of trees to people”, Proofing Future Europe: On forests in cities
- Speaker
- 22/6/2023
- “Every Tree Tells a Story: Lessons for Learning”, TrEE's Green Shoots Workshop, Glasgow, June 2023.
- Speaker
- 13/6/2023
- ECR and PGR Development – Engaged Scholarship for the Future of Entrepreneurship
- Participant
- 19/1/2023
- Active Travel Network Workshop
- Organiser
- 14/9/2022
- Potential of “heterotopia” notion for rethinking entrepreneurship research and pedagogy
- Speaker
- 15/6/2022
Projects
- Transforming Enterprise Education
- Drakopoulou Dodd, Sarah (Principal Investigator)
- 01-Dec-2022 - 31-Dec-2024
- PATHWAYS TO RESEARCH The Ink Way - Studying Structured Writing Interventions
- Drakopoulou Dodd, Sarah (Principal Investigator)
- 01-Apr-2022 - 31-Mar-2024
- Every Tree tells a Story
- Drakopoulou Dodd, Sarah (Principal Investigator)
- Contracted against UoS Terms via Invoice (agreed with funder)
- 01-Mar-2022 - 31-Dec-2023
- Migrant Entrepreneurship in Scotland
- Mwaura, Samuel (Principal Investigator) Drakopoulou Dodd, Sarah (Co-investigator) Lassalle, Paul (Co-investigator) Levie, Jonathan (Co-investigator) Stoyanov, Stoyan (Co-investigator)
- 27-Apr-2018 - 30-Sep-2018
- Building Growth: Deploying Entrepreneurial Capitals
- Karampela, Maria (Principal Investigator) Wilson, Juliette (Co-investigator) Drakopoulou Dodd, Sarah (Co-investigator) Danson, Mike (Co-investigator)
- Knowledge exchange event taking place during 'Engage with Strathclyde' Week 2017
- 04-May-2017 - 04-May-2017
- Growing Strong: Growth Challenges, Opportunities and Potential Collaboration Models
- Wilson, Juliette (Principal Investigator) Karampela, Maria (Co-investigator) Drakopoulou Dodd, Sarah (Co-investigator) Danson, Mike (Principal Investigator)
- Event as part of the 'Crafting Growth' project funded by the Scottish Universities Insight Institute
- 29-Mar-2017 - 29-Mar-2017
Contact
Professor
Sarah
Drakopoulou Dodd
Hunter Centre for Entrepreneurship, Strategy and Innovation
Email: sarah.dodd@strath.ac.uk
Tel: 548 3957