Appointment of Dean: Faculty of Commerce

Dear colleagues and students

It gives me great pleasure to announce that Associate Professor Linda Ronnie has been appointed as the new Dean of the Faculty of Commerce.

Associate Professor Ronnie, who will take up her new role on 22 October 2018, brings a wealth of institutional knowledge and experience. She joined the University of Cape Town (UCT) in 2002 as a senior lecturer in human resource management, and has since held numerous leadership positions. At the UCT Graduate School of Business (GSB), Associate Professor Ronnie held the position of director of the Associate in Management (AIM) and Postgraduate Diploma in Business Administration (PDBA) programmes until 2005, when she joined the Centre for Higher Education Development to contribute to academic staff development.

In 2006 she returned to the GSB as a senior lecturer in organisational behaviour and people management, and in 2008 she again became the director of the AIM and PDBA programmes. In 2016 she became acting academic director and in 2017 the Master of Business Administration (MBA) programme convenor. In the same year she served as ad hoc acting director of the GSB. After years of service she was promoted to associate professor of organisational behaviour and people management this year.

These roles, coupled with her background in applied psychology and her interest in the attraction, retention and motivation of talented, capable employees in diverse contexts and psychological wellbeing in the workplace, make her an ideal candidate to lead the faculty during this university-wide period of transition and transformation.

Her record reflects not only her exceptional leadership abilities but, equally as important, her emphasis on excellent teaching. In 2014 she was awarded the UCT Distinguished Teacher Award and in the same year was recognised as the GSB PDBA and MBA lecturer of the year. In 2016 she was a nominee for both the Case Centre’s Outstanding Case Teacher (the only candidate from Africa) and for the Higher Education Learning and Teaching Association of Southern Africa’s National Excellence in Teaching and Learning awards.

With her understanding of human interaction and motivation, Associate Professor Ronnie has presented to numerous international organisations, such as the United Nations, and universities, such as St Catherine’s (United States), Imperial College Business School (United Kingdom) and the TIAS School for Business and Society (Netherlands).

Her contributions extend beyond higher education. She has contributed to both industry and the public sector while consulting to Bidvest, the Cape Clothing and Textile Cluster, Barloworld, the Health Systems Trust, the Western Cape Department of Health and the National Treasury, among others.

Read Associate Professor Ronnie’s abridged CV.

Please join me in welcoming Associate Professor Ronnie to her new role at UCT.

Sincerely

Professor Mamokgethi Phakeng
Vice-Chancellor

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