Carol Linehan

Prof. Carol Linehan is a Professor in the School of Applied Psychology, University College Cork.  Her key interests relate to the application of psychology to the workplace.  She has particular interest in gender at work, emotion work in organisations, and the impacts of organisational work practices on employee identities and experiences of work.  

Carol holds a Masters in Occupational Psychology and Human Resource Management, a PhD in the area of learning and identity in organisations and is a Chartered Work and Organisational Psychologist with the Psychological Society of Ireland. Before joining UCC she worked at the University of Leicester where she contributed to the setup of the MSc in Occupational Psychology and the Diploma in the Psychology of Work. 

Carol has developed and directed a number of academic programmes at UCC including the professionally accredited MA in Work and Organisational Psychology and before that the Higher Diploma in Human Resource Management and the MSc in Human Resource Management in collaboration with ACE.

She has a track record of contribution at School, College and University levels via roles such as Chair of the ISS21 and Collective Social Futures Board (current); Chair of the School Athena Swan committee (current); Head of School of Applied Psychology (2020-2023); Vice Head of School (2018-2020); President’s nominee on the Lecturer Promotion and Establishment Board (current) and previously CACSSS rep to the board (2018-2022); University examinations appeals board (2016-2020); and various school roles as examinations officer, programme director, previous Chair of the Teaching and Learning committee etc.

Carol’s key research interests are centred on applying psychology to understand people’s experiences of work and organisations.  She has particular interest in the impacts of work practices on employees’ identities and experiences of work.  Recent work has appeared in journals such as Studies in Higher Education; Gender, Work and Organization; Management Communication Quarterly; and Human Relations.  Topics of interest include Work Psychology; Gender and Identity in Organisations; Emotional Labour; Impacts of Work Flexibility; Boundaries between Work and Home.

She has a track record of engaged, impact focused research work particularly in the area of improving gender equality in organisations.  A current project is 'Stronger Together' funded via the HEA Gender equality enhancement fund September 11th 2023.   Previously she was awarded, in conjunction with ISS21 and the UCC equality committee, a Pobal grant to create a gender equality action plan for the university sector.  Leading on from this work Carol was a member of the UCC team that won over 2 million funding for a multi-site EU project entitled 'Genovate: Transforming organisational culture for gender equality in research and innovation' (2013-2017).  The work on Genovate was recognised by a UCC Research Team of the Year award in 2017.  Following on from that she was part of the UCC team involved in RRING, a H2020 project on Responsible Research and Innovation (2018-2021).  Her role in this project, with colleagues in ISS21, was to bring gender expertise to further align the gender equality sustainable development goals with the overall RRI goals of the project. 

Carol currently acts as advisor, with supervisor Prof. Lui Ciolfi, to a Marie-Curie Fellow, Dr Ida Larsen-Ledet.  Ida is engaged in groundbreaking work on the role of ‘traces’ in work on the project ‘Traces of Work: Developing human-centred design principles for leveraging digital traces of activity in knowledge work’.

Carol has delivered research engaged, professionally focused courses at undergraduate, postgraduate and executive education levels.  

Her core teaching interests relate to understanding people and organisations.  A core value is to examine work from a multiple stakeholder perspective.  This addresses not only management issues/concerns but also the consequences of work design and management for a range of stakeholders, particularly worker well-being.  Particular topics include understanding emotion management in the workplace; work-life balance; identity & work; workplace flexibility; home-work boundaries; and gender at work.  

As well as teaching Carol developed, directs, and lead the accreditation bid for the postgraduate programme, MA in Work and Organisational Psychology/Behaviour.  This programme is  professionally accredited by the Division of Work and Organisational Psychology, Psychological Society of Ireland.  The programme plays an important role in enhancing student employability and enhancing the depth of skills in industry and organisations to support performance and well-being.

Recent Modules Taught:

• AP3128 Contemporary Issues in the Psychology of Work, Technology and Organisations
• AP6166 Personnel Selection and Assessment
• AP6169 Learning, Well-Being and Participation at Work
• AP6170 Professional Skills
• AP6171 Dissertation in Work and Organisational Psychology

Carol regularly Chairs/acts as independent examiners for PhDs in UCC including recently for a candidate in Applied Social Studies in 2025 and external examiner for a DCU PhD also in 2025.