Professor Lilian de Menezes appointed as Associate Dean for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at Bayes Business School

Bayes Business School is pleased to announce the appointment of Professor Lilian de Menezes as its first Associate Dean for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion.

The new role replaces the previous Associate Dean for People and Culture position, with a more dedicated focus on widening participation at the School to underline Bayes’ commitment to changing more than a name.

Lilian de Menezes, Professor of Decision Sciences, was appointed as Co-Director for Racial Equity and Inclusion at Bayes in November 2020 to help develop the School’s strategy on racial inclusion and support colleagues. As part of this role, she was instrumental in establishing the Bayes Business School Black Student Scholarship programme, which will award ten scholarships per year to UK-domiciled students of black ethnicity across the next ten years from the 2022/23 academic year.

Using extensive experience of championing diversity through research into equal opportunity and wellbeing, and involvement in City, University of London’s Athena Swan accreditation*, Professor de Menezes will also contribute to City’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion strategy.

Professor de Menezes said:

“It is a great honour to be appointed to this role at a time of such transformation at Bayes.

“Since it was decided that Sir John Cass’s name should be removed from our School, a lot of work has gone into examining how we can become a more inclusive community that is truly representative of society.

“I am proud of the steps we have taken so far, but there is still a lot to be done and I look forward to overseeing this work in my role as Associate Dean.”

Professor Caroline Wiertz, Deputy Dean of Bayes Business School said:

“We are delighted that Professor de Menezes will be stepping into this role.

“Working closely with myself, Malla Pratt (Director for Racial Equity and Inclusion) and Dr Janina Steinmetz (Academic Director of the Global Women's Leadership Programme), alongside our Faculty Champions for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, Professor de Menezes will continue to drive and develop our work to change more than a name – which we promised and are fully committed to.

“The appointment of an Associate Dean as a dedicated leader in this area will accelerate the implementation of our initiatives and help us extend our work to widen participation at Bayes.”

Read more about Bayes Business School’s name change.

Find out more about the Bayes Business School Black Student Scholarship programme.

*City has held an institutional-level Bronze Award under Advance HE’s Athena SWAN since 2017, with a submission for renewal aimed for 2022.

Since the launch of the EDI strategy in early 2020, City’s focus has expanded beyond gender inequalities, and recognises the importance of taking an anti-racist and intersectional approach to tackling organisational and educational inequalities that honour the nuanced differences of ethnic and intersectional diversity of our student and staff bodies. Since the summer of 2020, City has started moving away from thinking of equality, diversity and inclusion work as an ‘add-on’ consideration and focused on it becoming a strategic priority that is embedded throughout the University.