Simon Bell

Simon is Professor of Marketing and Head of MSPACE, the University of Melbourne’s School of Professional and Continuing Education. MSPACE aims to become a global leader in industry-focused educational offerings tailored to meet the needs of individuals and organisations and accessible through different modes of delivery, including face-to-face, online and intensive programs. Simon studies how firms can become a more effective organisations by engaging with customers more meaningfully.

He focuses on how frontline employees interact with customers to create value for the customer, the firm, and themselves. He also studies how regional clusters can sustain performance of individual firms and create conditions for innovation. Behind all his research is the idea that by recasting how firms connect with others, whether that is their customers, staff, or other firms, they can build strong brands and beneficial relationships. His research has focused on the retail and financial services industries and has been published in journals such as the Journal of Marketing, the Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, the Academy of Management Review, and Harvard Business Review. He sits on the editorial board of the Journal of Marketing.

With his focus on academically rigorous research for real-world problems in industry, government, and not-for-profit organisations, Professor Bell has worked extensively with industry in a research, consulting, and executive education capacity. He has worked with organisations locally and abroad including PWC, Honda, Ailo, Salesforce.com, Agricultural Bank of China, and IBM. He has also delivered executive education courses for Cambridge University, Duke Corporate Education, and Melbourne University. He remains a Fellow of Judge Business School at Cambridge University.