Richard Scase

About Richard Scase

Professor Richard Scase is a leading authority on leadership, innovation and corporate change. Many of his writings study the impact of market and socio-demographic trends for the re-invention and renewal of business practices, processes and leadership styles. In his talks, he draws upon a broad wealth of experience, derived from the practicalities of running his own businesses through to working with private and public sector organisations around the globe. He gives examples of how the need for tough leadership styles in periods of economic uncertainty, exercised in the appropriate ways, can be highly inspirational and motivational, leading to high sustained corporate performance.

As an academic, his research interests range from organisational change and entrepreneurship to the impact of Internet technologies and the restructuring of work and employment worldwide. He has a geographical breadth of experience on his résumé too – it includes the title of Emeritus Professor of Organisational Change at the University of Kent as well as visiting professorships at the University of London, Beijing University, Auckland (New Zealand), Monash University (Australia), Tilburg University (the Netherlands), and the University of Essex. He is therefore ideally placed to comment on the latest macroeconomic trends, and on how businesses and individuals should adapt to them.

As an entrepreneur, Professor Scase has co-founded and sold two successful media businesses: a major radio station serving the south-east of England, and an on-line provider of learning materials for corporate management development programmes. He therefore has an affinity with business audiences, reflected in the high volume of practical, useful advice he packs into each engagement.

As a journalist, author and public-speaker, Professor Scase frequently combines ideas from his various areas of expertise to create tailored forecasts or “future scenarios” for his audiences. Recent subjects he has covered extensively include: the threats and opportunities that will be faced by Western businesses as India and China continue to grow; the global trends affecting individuals as workers, citizens and consumers; and the ways in which global supply chains must be harnessed to serve increasingly localised markets.

Professor Scase is a frequent contributor of feature articles to national newspapers, professional magazines and programmes on radio and television. He also writes regular columns for Business Voice (the official monthly publication of the CBI) and The Observer newspaper. Furthermore, he has been commissioned to write policy-focused, official reports for government and other statutory bodies. These include “Fit and Fifty” for an all-party committee of MPs representing older workers in the UK, “Europe in 2010” for the European parliament, and “Regional Futures 2003” for the UK’s National Housing Federation.

Professor Scase is the author of over 20 books, including “Britain in 2010: The Changing Business Landscape,” which painted such a vivid picture of the future that it influenced a swathe of UK government policy, as well as being critically acclaimed worldwide. He has also written extensively on how to stimulate entrepreneurialism in large organisations; manage creativity; motivate and lead; and leverage corporate intelligence. In his most recent work, “Global Remix,” he explores the impact of incipient global trends – technological, economic, demographic, cultural, political and social – on both businesses and individuals.

Professor Scase was recently voted one of the Top Ten most influential people in Britain on personnel/human resource management issues by Personnel Today magazine. In addition, he is a former winner of the prestigious European Business Speaker of the Year Award.

He has addressed audiences at a variety of high-profile organisations including: BT, Unisys, BP, Hewlett Packard, IBM, N.M. Rothschild & Sons, KPMG, the Department of Trade & Industry, BUPA, the National Housing Federation, the National Audit Office, The Leadership Trust, the Royal Bank of Scotland, Royal Mail, the BBC, Mercer Human Resources, Trinity Mirror, The Cabinet Office, the Chartered Institute of Personnel Development, the Institute of Management, the Institute of Directors as well as various development agencies and chambers of commerce.