Project Team
Dr Colin Ashurst
Senior Teaching Fellow in MIS
Durham Business School
Colin joined Durham Business School in 2004 as a Senior Teaching Fellow and is teaching Information Systems & Business Transformation on Undergraduate, MA, and MBA programmes. He is also Director of Learning & Teaching for the School. The focus of his work is on realising benefits from investments in Information Systems.
Most recently Colin has worked as a Strategy Consultant with Microsoft for 5 years working with a wide range of organisations in the public and private sectors. Engagements covered many scenarios including ecommerce, knowledge management and project management processes. He led the Microsoft UK input to the Cranfield Information Systems Research Centre for 5 years and was involved in a number of research projects. Previous employers include Asda and PwC.
Colin completed his MBA in 1997 and PhD in 2007. He is a Chartered Accountant, became a member of the British Computer Society and Chartered IT Professional and a member of the Association of Project Management.
Colin's PhD explored the organisational practices and competencies required to succeed in realising benefits from IT investments. His current research builds on this foundation and is focusing on developing the capability of individuals and organisations to succeed with IT-enabled change and business transformation. His research interests include:
- IS strategy
- identifying opportunities and priorities for IS investments
- realising benefits from IS investments
- succeeding with projects and programmes to deliver organisational change, particularly where business innovation and change are significant and building the organisational capability to succeed in realising value from the IS investment portfolio.
- improving knowledge work
- exploring the value of practices and patterns to establish a practical toolkit to contribute to the development of competences for IT-enabled transformation.
Colin has broad commercial experience focused on succeeding with IS projects and improving organisational performance through exploiting Information Systems.