Jim Kitay

Jim Kitay is Honorary Associate Professor in the Discipline of Work and Organisational Studies at the University of Sydney Business School. He has held significant leadership roles, including Head of the Discipline, succeeding Greg Patmore and preceding Chris Wright, and served as Deputy Dean alongside John Shields and Greg Patmore. Kitay played a pivotal role in the early development of the human resource management curriculum during the 1990s, working closely with Robin Kramar and other staff members. He contributed to the department's transition from Industrial Relations to Work and Organisational Studies in 2001, emphasizing an inclusive approach to studying regulation and employee experiences within management-led organizations, as discussed in Lansbury and Kitay (1997). His administrative contributions supported the discipline's collegial leadership and integration into the Business School.

Kitay's research encompasses employment relations, industrial relations, and management consulting. He co-edited Changing Employment Relations in Australia (Oxford University Press, 1997) with Russell Lansbury, examining changes in work organization, staffing, skill formation, pay, and performance amid declining union membership and employer strategies like lean production. The study covered industries including domestic airlines, automotive, retail banking, information technology, steel, and telecommunications, in collaboration with MIT researchers such as Tom Kochan. With Chris Wright, he explored management consultants critically, drawing on labour process theory and sociology of work literature (Kitay and Wright 2004). Key publications include 'From Prophets to Profits: The Occupational Rhetoric of Management Consultants' (2007), 'Take the Money and Run? Organisational Boundaries and Consultants' Roles' (2004), 'Diversity and Change in Work and Employment Relations' (2006), and 'The Role and Challenge of Case Study Design in Industrial Relations Research' (2018). As a member of the Business and Labour History Group, he investigates 'A history of occupational health nursing in NSW,' tracing nurses' roles in workplaces from the early 1900s to the early 2000s, including social, organisational, legislative contexts, associations, and educational arrangements. His work has 33 publications and 679 citations on ResearchGate.

Professional Email: jim.kitay@sydney.edu.au