Meet our Leaders
As AIB Oceania’s main governing body, our leadership team is responsible for member outreach, facilitating professional development opportunities and engagement with diverse stakeholders, and organizing our annual Chapter Conference.
Below, you’ll find background details on each of our team members, our roles and responsibilities, and contact information to help you connect with us online.
Sara McGaughey
President & Chair
Chapter Chair
The Chapter Chair oversees all executive committee functions, including membership outreach, event coordination, working closely with local event hosts, and financial management.
Sara Lisa McGaughey
Sara McGaughey is Professor of International Business at Griffith University, Australia. Her Ph.D. was awarded by the University of Queensland, and her MBA and B.A. by Monash University, Australia. Sara’s research in international business is at the intersection of strategy, organisation and entrepreneurship, and appears in journals such as Academy of Management Review, Journal of International Business Studies, Business History, Journal of Management Studies, Journal of International Management, Journal of World Business and Management International Review, and in research monographs on corporate entrepreneurship and small firm internationalisation.
A passionate educator and Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, UK (SFHEA), Sara is committed to engaged pedagogies that help equip students and practitioners with the skills to question, critique and generate new knowledge such that they may not only respond and adapt, but also anticipate and shape the world in which they live and work. Sara currently serves as Chapter Chair of the Academy of International Business–Oceania, is an elected member of Griffith University’s Academic Committee (i.e. Academic Board), and serves on the editorial boards of Journal of World Business and Management International Review.
Elizabeth Rose
Immediate-Past President & Chair
Immediate-Past Chapter Chair
The Immediate-Past Chapter Chair assists the current Chapter Chair in the execution of their duties, at their request.
Elizabeth Rose
Elizabeth L. Rose is Professor of International Business at the University of Leeds. She is also an Adjunct Professor of Business Policy and Strategy at the Indian Institute of Management Udaipur (India). A dual citizen of New Zealand and the United States, her previous academic appointments have been in New Zealand, Finland, and the U.S. She holds a BSE (Civil Engineering) from Princeton University and an MSE (Civil Engineering), an AM (Statistics), and a PhD (Business Administration, emphasis in Statistics and Management Science), all from the University of Michigan.
Beth’s research addresses various aspects of how firms internationalize and compete across borders; she works at the intersection of international business and strategy. She has ongoing interests in the internationalization activities of service-sector and smaller firms. Not surprisingly, for someone who started her academic career as a statistician, most of her research is quantitative in nature, and emphasizes the use of robust approaches in modelling. Beth’s work has appeared in a variety of top-tier journals, including the Journal of International Business Studies.
Beth has held leadership roles in several academic professional organizations. She served as an AIB Vice President for Administration, where she had the great pleasure of working closely with AIB chapter chairs from around the globe. She was the founding chair of the AIB’s Australia and New Zealand Chapter (AIB-ANZ), and is a past President of both the Australia and New Zealand International Business Academy (ANZIBA) and the Association of Japanese Business Studies (AJBS). She has also been Chair of the Strategic Management Society’s Global Strategy Interest Group. Beth has chaired the Research Committee of the Academy of Management’s International Management Division, and recently completed a five-year term as a member of the Division’s Executive Committee.
Tom Osegowitsch
VP, Secretary-Treasurer
VP, Secretary-Treasurer
The Vice President, Secretary-Treasurer helps to record and communicate chapter business, as well as overseeing the group’s financial activities.
Tom Osegowitsch
Tom is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Management & Marketing at the University of Melbourne. His main research interests lie at the intersection of International Business and Strategic Management. His work has been published in academic outlets such as the Journal of International Business Studies, Business Horizons, Multinational Business Review and Journal of Management and Organization.
Sol Abdulhak
VP, Communications
VP, Communications
The Vice President, Communications is responsible for creating and disseminating official chapter announcements, promoting the group among PhD students, and assisting in the organization of the Annual Symposium and Paper Development Workshop.
Sol Abdulhak
Sol is an experienced Researcher and Teaching Associate in the final stages of his PhD Candidacy at Monash University in the area of Strategy and International Business. His research broadly focuses on subsidiary level dynamic performance, institutional distance, and sub-national location choice in the international business area. Other research includes the phenomenon of reshoring, inter/intra-regional expansion and cultural complexity.
Sol has taught several strategy and international business classes at Monash University and has been teaching Business Judgement at the University of Melbourne since September 1, 2020.
Maureen Benson-Rea
VP, 2020 Conference Co-Chair
VP, 2020 Conference Co-Chair
The Conference Co-Chair manages event logistics for the chapter’s annual research symposium and paper development workshop.
Maureen Benson-Rea
Maureen specialises in international business (particularly Europe) and strategic management. With teaching and large-scale programme management experience in the UK, Maureen has also held several positions as an international policy advisor, lobbyist and analyst with a major British business organisation. Her current research interests lie in the area of networks in internationalisation strategies and cooperative business strategies in general.
Virginia Cathro
VP, Administration
VP, Administration
The Vice President Administration acts as general secretary, presents on behalf of the board, and supports grass roots activities for hosting and coordinating events.
Virginia Cathro
Virginia Cathro is currently a researcher and educator in the Department of Management at the University of Otago and the International Business Director Undergraduate. She describes herself as a teacher, coach, facilitator, researcher and project enthusiast. Her research work has appeared in several peer reviewed scientific publications.
She has published in academic journals in the areas of intercultural negotiation, developing global virtual team competences, mediation and conflict resolution, critical reflection and experiential learning, the future of work using Delphi method and scenario planning, graduate competencies and selection practices, e-mentoring and expatriate performance management. Her current research focus examines global virtual team performance, internationalisation and foreign direct investment and indigenous research practices encompassing the business challenges faced and embraced by New Zealand Maori
Vikas Kumar
VP, Journal Outreach
Vikas Kumar
Vikas Kumar is Head of Discipline and Professor in the Discipline of International Business at the University of Sydney Business School. His previous appointments were at Bocconi University as Assistant Professor in the Department of Management, and as Visiting Scholar at Stanford University and Dunning Fellow at University of Reading.
He is the Editor-in-Chief of Journal of International Management (JIM), one of the top five journals in the field of International Business and an ABDC A ranked journal. Vikas has previously served as Senior and Reviewing Editor at Asia Pacific Journal of Management (APJM) and as Associate Editor at Cross Cultural and Strategic Management (CCSM). He was the Editor-in-Chief of Journal of Asia Business Studies (JABS) in 2019.
Simon Mowatt
2020 Conference Co-Chair
Simon Mowatt
Simon is the Head of Department for International Business, Strategy and Entrepreneurship and leader of the Business & Labour History Group within the New Zealand Work Research Institute. Simon is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and former President of the Academic Association of Historians in Australian and New Zealand Business Schools (AAHANZBS).
Simon’s principal research interest focuses on international business strategy, networks and alliances within a historical framework. In particular this research has examined industries that have been transformed by changes in organisation and technology, such as the grocery and the publishing industries. His research has gained support both from industry, major research funding bodies such as the Leverhulme Trust, the Economic and Social Research Council (UK), and government.
Simon has been teaching in business schools at graduate and postgraduate level since 1994, and currently teaches on a range of papers across the PhD, MBus, MBA and BBus programmes, and has delivered executive development programmes for major organizations internationally.
Alex Eapen
2019 Conference Chair
2019 Conference Chair
The Past Conference Chair supports and provides consultation on the planning process for the chapter’s annual research symposium and paper development workshop.
Alex Eapen
Dr. Alex Eapen earned his doctoral degree from Tilburg University, The Netherlands in June 2007, and is currently Associate Professor of Strategy at the Research School of Management at ANU.
His current research seeks to better understand the impact of multinational enterprises (MNE) on host country firms and economies. The specific questions his research seeks to answer are (a) what are the conditions that make the presence of foreign MNEs beneficial to host country firms? and (b) empirically, how do we correctly estimate the magnitude of such ‘external effects’ of foreign MNEs? These issues have far-reaching implications, not only theoretically, but also for practice and policy formulation.
His research has been published in journals such as Organization Science, Journal of International Business Studies, Economic Modelling, and Canadian Journal of Administrative Sciences.
Dr. Eapen has received several international awards for his research. His doctoral thesis was one of the four finalists for the coveted Gunnar Hedlund prize (2007) given by the Stockholm School of Economics for the best dissertation in International business written at universities around the world. He also won the Verity Award for the most outstanding paper published in the Canadian Journal of Administrative Sciences in 2009. His publication titled ‘Social structure and technology spillovers from foreign to domestic firms’ was selected and highlighted by the editors of the Journal of International Business Studies as an example of ‘groundbreaking scholarship’. He was also a joint recipient of the 2019 CEIBS Best Paper Prize given by the Academy of Management, finalist for the 2015 Alan Rugman Young Scholar award (formerly, Haynes Prize) given by the Academy of International Business, and finalist for the 2017 Carolyn Dexter Award given by the Academy of Management.
His teaching interests are concentrated on ‘Strategic Management’, and he has delivered courses to MBA and Executive Education audiences.