Dr Grace Gao

Assistant Professor

School: Newcastle Business School

Grace is a Senior Lecturer in Leadership and HR Management at Newcastle Business School, and the Associate Editor for Gender, Work and Organization (CABS3*). She has led the curation of an inaugural Special Section at Management Learning (CABS3*), devoted to the phenomenon of "(Un)learning from the Margins in Management and Organization Research". She has also co-edited a Special Issue Towards an Integrated Theory of Gender, Time and Organisations at the International Journal of Management Reviews (CABS3*).

Her area of expertise encompasses relational and interdisciplinary perspectives on equality, diversity, and inclusion at work. This involves incorporating feminist theories and interrogating work on the gendered nature of non-traditional employment and the emergence of women in male-dominated sectors across borders. Grace graduated from the Management School of the University of Sheffield, UK. She has examined how the intersection of gender, race/ethnicity, time, space, and lifestyle can construct and reconstruct younger agents' career trajectories in computing and IT as part of her Ph.D. thesis.

Grace has been working on several impactful projects, including the Gender-Inclusive Cities project (exploring spatial and urban dimensions of gender and inclusion) and the Wellcome Trust ASPIRE Programme (2025, in collaboration with the University of Birmingham). She is currently working on EPHEMERAL Entrepreneurship and Place: How Entrepreneurs Manage Evolving Relationships Across the Life-cycle (Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Doctoral Networks) funded by EU Horizons (2025-2029). Her broader ongoing research agenda encompasses singlehood, critical race, decolonial feminism, work-family dynamics, and female entrepreneurship.

Grace is active in engaging with qualitative resesearch methods and creative forms of writing, informed by feminist epistemologies, to explore issues of gender, diversity, embodiment, ethics and affect in organisations. Grace's research has appeared in international outlets such as Gender, Work and Organization, Journal of Family Theory and Review, Studies in Higher Education, and Management Learning.

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Research Themes and Scholarly Interests

Intersections between gender, race, identity work, agency and power relations in organisation studies;

Technofeminism, sex and changing subjectivites;

Singlehood and work-family dynamics;

Inclusion, diversity and equality in the workplace;

Gender, AI and the Future of Work.

Key Publications

Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
An exploratory study on transformative change towards inclusive workplaces through international internships: a feminist perspective, Truong, T., Doan, T., Ta, L., Gao, G. 23 Mar 2026, In: Studies in Higher Education
Collective Autoethnography in Critical Management Studies: Investigating Neoliberal Universities, Academic Work and Identities Through Researcher Reflexivity, Gao, G., Sai, L. 16 Jan 2026
Exploring gendered space in Frances Ha: a cinematic analysis of feminist urbanism in New York City, Huang, K., Jin, J., Li, Z., Gao, G. 23 Jul 2026, In: Gender, Place & Culture: A Journal of Feminist Geography
Multilingual un/learning for decolonizing management and organization studies research and education, Reiss, E., Gonzalez, C., Kaasila-Pakanen, A., Quental, C., Mandalaki, E., Gao, G., Pullen, A., Vera-Colina, M., Arntsen, A., Católico, D., F. Feris, R., Hadjisolomou, A., Lee, H., Lecomte, L., Lecomte, U., Patiño Jacinto, R., Maria, M., R. Quintero, K., Mario, M., Spellman, C., Tanhua, I., Thenot, M., Maria, M. 12 Jul 2026, In: Management Learning
Un/learning from the margins: Rethinking knowledge and learning in management research, Gao, G., Sai, L., Canal, M., Kaasila-Pakanen, A., Mandalaki, E., Williams, J. 1 Jul 2026, In: Management Learning
Sharing a home, but not a family: The unspoken stories of cohabiting with divorced partners and their children, Sai, L., Gao, G. 8 Sep 2025, In: Journal of Family Theory and Review
Co-constructing new ways of working: Relationality and care in post-pandemic academia, Sai, L., Gao, G., Mandalaki, E., Zhang, L., Williams, J. 2 Sep 2024, In: Culture and Organization
Exploring caring collaborations in academia through feminist reflexive dialogues, Johansson, J., Gao, G., Sölvell, ., Wigren-Kristoferson, C. 1 Sep 2024, In: Gender, Work & Organization
Learning from Using Feminist Duoethnography in Organization Research: Exploring Women’s Experiences of Everyday Racism and Changing Racial Identities, Gao, G., Sai, L. 21 Feb 2024
Questing the Work-Life Challenges Faced by Solo-Living Women Academics: Can there be a “life” for us?, Gao, G., Sai, L., Xu, M. 5 Feb 2024, Work-Life Inclusion , Bingley, Emerald Publishing

Current and Recent Projects

Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
EPHEMERAL Entrepreneurship and Place: How Entrepreneurs Manage Evolving Relationships Across the Life-cycle, Bosworth, G. (Principal Investigator), Gao, G. (Co Investigator), European Commission, 01/10/25 - 30/09/29, £327,780.00

PGR Supervision

Jonathon Wilson Exploring the work-life experiences of childfree professionals: Challenges, opportunities and future change at work Start Date: 01/10/2025 End Date: 17/10/2025
Jonathon Wilson Exploring the work-life experiences of childfree professionals: Challenges, opportunities and future change at work Start Date: 01/10/2025 End Date: 03/12/2025
Veronika Ivannikova Start Date: 01/07/2026
Charlotte Wren Exploring the work-life experiences of childfree professionals: Challenges,opportunities and future change at work Start Date: 01/04/2026