Tine Buyl
Associate professor at the Department of Organization Studies at Tilburg School of Social and Behavioral Sciences.
Can you introduce yourself?
Of course! My name is Tine Buyl. I am associate professor at the Department of Organization Studies at Tilburg School of Social and Behavioral Sciences. I divide my attention between teaching, research, and management tasks, as I am also part of the department’s daily board. I was born and raised in Antwerp, Belgium. Even though I started working at Tilburg University in September 2015, I still live in Belgium, as I didn’t want to leave the greatest city in the world (Antwerp), where I live with my husband, 2 daughters, and cat.
Research and education are two important pillars of academia. What do they mean to you?
Both are very important to me. I am passionate about teaching – I love to transfer knowledge to students, and to help them in developing a critical, but informed opinion on matters. As a teacher, I see myself as a storyteller: (1) bringing captivating stories to inform students, (2) using a clear storyline to ensure that students know where each piece of information fits into the whole story, and (3) doing all of this in an enthusiastic, accessible and compassionate way. My teaching interest is strategy in a very broad sense, going from a basic introductory course on strategy and organization for 1st-year bachelor students to specialized seminars on strategic leadership for research master students. Doing research is my other passion. My main research area is also strategy, and more in particular strategic leadership. I study how CEOs and top managers (strategic leaders) affect their organizations’ strategies, and how this subsequently translates into performance outcomes. For instance, I have worked on studies relating CEO greed and narcissism to outcomes such as corporate social responsibility, risk-taking, and organizational resilience to systemic shocks. Other, related, research topics I have been studying are the composition of top management teams, executive mobility, and managers’ responses to feedback on past performance.
You are now one of the initial members of the TYA. How is that like?
Evidently, I am very happy and proud to be part of the Tilburg Young Academy. Participating in this platform of young academics gives me the opportunity to help building a university where it is stimulating, motivating, and fun to work – a university where I WANT to work. We want to ensure that early-career scholars have a seat at the table when important decisions are made.
I am sure you all have topics that are important to you. What is your main focus in the TYA?
Given my (research and teaching) background in strategy, I am very much interested in Tilburg University’s strategic direction. With TYA, I want to make sure young academics’ voices are heard and represented in Tilburg University’s strategic plan, and that their needs and preferences are taken into account. Apart from that, I also support the new Recognition and Rewards programme. In my role as member of the daily board of our department (with responsibility for HR and finance), I regularly see how (young) academics suffer because of the ever-rising work pressure. I hope that with TYA, we can bring across this message in the new Recognition and Rewards programme, as well as in Tilburg University’s new strategic plan for the coming years.