Professor Nicola Burgess
Professor of Operations Management

Profile

Biography

Nicola joined the School for Business and Society as Professor of Operations Management in October 2023. Prior to that, she was Reader of Operations management at Warwick Business School, University of Warwick. Nicola also holds a visiting position at Warwick Business School. Her research focuses on service delivery in health and care settings and has a particular focus on process improvement, quality and patient safety. She has published in a variety of journals including world-leading operations journals Journal of Operations Management and European Journal of Operations Research, as well as world-leading journals in other disciplines such as Human
Resource Management, British Journal of Management, and also the British Medical Journal. Nicola is also co-author of the internationally best-selling Operations Management textbook with Nigel Slack and Alistair Brandon-Jones and has recently developed a strong social media profile where she regularly shares her research through an engaging series of blogs and and accompanying graphics.

Research

Overview

Nicola’s research focuses on service delivery in health and care settings and has a particular focus on process improvement, quality and patient safety. Nicola has worked with and led several high-profile evaluations of improvement in hospitals in the UK and other parts of the world. She recently completed the national evaluation of a partnership between the NHS and Virginia Mason Institute, based in Seattle, U.S., funded by The Health Foundation. The outputs of this multi-method, longitudinal and processual evaluation have been instrumental to shaping national policy that requires all hospitals in England to develop a systematic approach to improvement.

Current research seeks to understand how we shape cultural readiness for improvement and how build capability within organisations concerned to lead for improvement. Nicola is also interested in the use social network analysis as a method of examining and evaluating existing networks and identifying opportunities to build a more distributed network to support a culture of continuous improvement. Nicola is interested to supervise doctoral students with a focus on the how of developing a receptive culture for continuous improvement within public, private and/or third sector settings.

Teaching

Other teaching

Nicola has extensive experience of teaching at all levels including foundation year, undergraduate and postgraduate (including MSc, MBA and executive education). Nicola is co-author of the leading Operations Management textbooks: Operations Management (10th Edition), Operations and Process Management (7th Edition), and Essentials of Operations Management (3rd Edition).

Publications

Full publications list

Journal articles

Richmond, J.G. and Burgess, N., 2023. Prosocial voice in the hierarchy of healthcare professionals: the role of emotions after harmful patient safety incidents. Journal of Health Organization and Management. Vol. 37 No. 3, pp. 327-342

Johnson, M., Burgess, N. and Sethi, S. (2020) "Temporal pacing of outcomes for improving patient flow: design science research in a National Health Service hospital", Journal of Operations Management, 66, 1-2, 35-53 (ABS 4)

Burgess, N., Richmond, J. G. and Kiefer, T. (2020) "Psychological contracting making obligations explicit to support a transformative change partnership", Academy of Management Proceedings, 2020, 1, 10233

Burgess, N., Currie, G., Crump, B., Richmond, J. G. and Johnson, M. (2019) "Improving together : collaboration needs to start with regulators", BMJ, 367, l6392

Currie, G., Burgess, N., Tuck, P. “The (un)desirability of hybrid managers as ‘controlled’ professionals: comparative cases of tax and healthcare professionals" (2016) Journal of Professions and Organization, Volume 3, Issue 2, September 2016, Pages 142–153.

Currie, G., Burgess, N., Hayton, J. (2015) "HR practices and knowledge brokering by hybrid middle managers in hospital settings: The influence of professional hierarchy" Human Resource Management, 54: 793-812 (ABS 4)

Burgess, N., Strauss, K., Currie, G., Wood, G. "Organizational ambidexterity and the hybrid middle manager: the case of patient safety in UK hospitals" (2015) Human Resource Management, 54: s87-s109 (ABS 4)

Burgess N. and Currie, G. (2013) ‘The knowledge brokering role of the hybrid middle Level manager (MLM): The case of Healthcare’, British Journal of Management, 24: S132–S142 (ABS 4)

Robinson, S; Radnor, Z; Burgess, N; Worthington, C. (2014) ‘Facilitated Modelling with Discrete-Event Simulation: Reality or Myth?’, European Journal Of Operational Research, p.231-240 (ABS 4)

Robinson, S; Radnor, Z; Burgess, N; Worthington, C. (2012) ‘Utilising Simulation in the Implementation of Lean in Healthcare’ European Journal Of Operational Research, Volume 219, Issue 1, Pages 188–197. (ABS 4)

Burgess, N.J. and Radnor, Z. (2012) ‘Service improvement in the English NHS: Complexities and Tensions’, Journal of Management Organisation, Vol. 18 (5), Pages 594-697.

Burgess, N., Wake, N. (2013) "The applicability of the Viable Systems Model as a diagnostic for small to medium sized enterprises", International Journal of Productivity and Performance Management, Vol. 62 Iss: 1, Pages 29 – 46.

Burgess, N.J. and Radnor, Z. (2013) ‘Evaluating Lean in healthcare: a typology’ International Journal of Health Care Quality Assurance, Vol. 26 (3) Most downloaded paper 2015

Lowson, R. H., and Burgess, N. J., (2002), “Supply Network Strategies and Supply Chain Management for E-Business” Journal of Operations Research, 4, 3, Pages 97 – 108.

Lowson, R. H., and Burgess, N. J., (2002), “The Building Blocks of an Operations Strategy for E-Business,” Total Quality Management, 3, 4, Pages 87 – 103.

Books

Slack., N., Brandon-Jones, A., Burgess, N. (2024) Operations and Process Management (7th Edition), Pearson.

Slack., N., Brandon-Jones, A., Burgess, N. (2023) Essentials of Operations Management (3rd Edition), Pearson.

Burgess., N. and Currie, G. (2023) Shaping High Quality, Affordable and Equitable Healthcare: Meaningful Innovation and System Transformation, Edited book, Palgrave Macmillan.

Slack., N., Brandon-Jones, A., Burgess, N. (2022) Operations Management (10 th Edition), Pearson.

eBooks

Burgess, N. Six Lessons: Leading for Improvement, published by Centre for Health and Care Improvement and Innovation (CHIRON), Warwick Business School.

Book Chapters

Burgess, N., Currie, G., Hardy, A. (2023) Introduction: Shaping High Quality, Affordable and Equitable Healthcare: Meaningful Innovation and System Transformation, p.1-20, in Burgess, N. and Currie, G. (Eds) Shaping High Quality, Affordable and Equitable Healthcare: Meaningful Innovation and System Transformation, Palgrave Macmillan

Burgess, N. (2023) Partnership for Improvement: How a Leadership Compact Fostered Relational Change between Five Hospital Chief Executives and Their Regulator, p.47-66, in Burgess, N. and Currie, G. (Eds) Shaping High Quality, Affordable and Equitable Healthcare: Meaningful Innovation and System Transformation, Palgrave Macmillan

Dawson, A., Burgess, N., Latusynzska, A. (2023) The Role of Quality Improvement in Sustaining Healthcare During Crisis (p. 233-250) in Burgess, N. and Currie, G. (Eds) Shaping High Quality, Affordable and Equitable Healthcare: Meaningful Innovation and System Transformation, Palgrave Macmillan

Currie, G. & Burgess, N. (2015) Enhancing the knowledge brokering capability of hybrid middle managers in a professionalized context, in: S. W. Floyd, B. Wooldridge, Handbook of Middle Management Strategy Process Research, Edward Elgar Publishing Limited, 2015.

Burgess, N., Radnor, Z., and Furnival, J (2015) Delivery not departments: A case study of a whole organisation approach to lean implementation across an English hospital. In: Radnor, Z., Bateman, N., Esain, A., Kumar, M., Williams, S.J., Upton, D.M., editor(s). Public Service Operations Management: A research handbook. 1 ed. Abingdon, UK: Routledge; 2015. p. 310-327

Burgess, N., Worthington C., Davis, N., Radnor, Z., Robinson, S., Cooke, M. (2011). SimLean Healthcare: Handbook. www.simlean.org (accessed February 2012). SimLean Publishing.

Worthington, C., Robinson, S., Burgess, N. and Radnor, Z. (2010). ‘Rapid Modelling of Patient Flow in a Health Care Setting: Integrating Simulation with Lean.’  Rapid Modelling and Quick Response: Intersection of Theory and Practice (Reiner, G., ed.). Springer, London, Pages 131-142.