Dr. Alexia Panayiotou

Dr. Alexia Panayiotou

Alexia Panayiotou is the UNESCO Co-Chair in Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment at the University of Cyprus, where she is an Associate Professor in Management and Organization Studies in the Department of Business and Public Administration.

She completed undergraduate and graduate studies at Stanford University and has a doctorate in Human Development and Psychology from Harvard University. 

Her research interests include critical management pedagogy; gender and work; feminist analysis of organizations; organizational paradoxes and tensions; the representation of management and organizations in popular culture; organizational space and symbolism; visuality; and organizational narratives. Her work has appeared, amongst others, in the Academy of Management Learning and Education, Management Learning, Strategic Organization, Organization, and the Journal of Management Inquiry.  Her article "Paradoxes of Change" (co-authored with G. Kassinis) received the 2016 Best Paper Award in the Academy of Management Organizational Development and Change division and was a finalist for the all-Academy Dexter Award. Dr. Panayiotou is currently an Associate Editor of the journal Gender, Work and Organization. She has served as an Associate Editor of Management Learning, an Associate Editor of the European Management Review and has been on the Editorial Boards of the British Journal of Management and Equality, Diversity and Inclusion.

With extensive NGO experience both in Cyprus and the US, Dr. Panayiotou remains passionate about social change. She has served as the Cyprus expert in the European Commission’s Expert Group on Gender, Employment and Social Inclusion, an independent expert for the Mutual Learning Programme of the European Employment Strategy, and as a board member of the Mediterranean Institute of Gender Studies. Dr. Panayiotou is also a one of the first 100 core members of the global network Women Waging Peace and instrumental in setting up the first battered women’s center in Cyprus and its related hotline. Dr. Panayiotou is also a core member of the University of Cyprus Gender Studies program, where she teaches both MA and PhD students.