Graham Dietz

Graham's primary research interest is trust at work, with a particular interest in how trust is built and enhanced and sustained among colleagues, and between leaders and their followers. He also conducts research into the impact of HR policies and practices on trust (see IJHRM, 2007; ISMO, forthcoming).

His other major trust research involves post-hoc examinations into how organisations seek to repair trust relationships after a major failure such as a scandal, or fatal accident (see AMR, 2009; also Institute of Business Ethics reports, 2011, 2012).

He has also published research on entrepreneurs' trust in their venture capitalist backers (ISBJ, 2011), and HRM in e-commerce firms (ISBJ, 2006). For more details, see below.

He has published a series of high-profile practitioner reports on trust, including one on organisation-level trust-building and trust repair for the Institute of Business Ethics (Building and Restoring Organisational Trust), and on trust relationships and HR for the CIPD (Where has all the trust gone?).

Finally, Graham has provided commentary on trust in the workplace in several mainstream media and industry outlets, including The Sunday Times (Time to offer up a sacrifice, How to negotiate your psychological contract), HR Director, and The Guardian (How to rebuild trust in business, Rebuilding trust: When sympathy dried up for Severn Trent Water, Rebuilding trust: How Siemens atoned for its sins).

Graham completed his PhD at the London School of Economics in 2002. The research comprised four qualitative case studies on the development of trust in 'workplace partnership' arrangements (see his article in the Human Resource Management Journal, 14:1, 2004). After his PhD, he worked as a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at Erasmus University in Rotterdam, before arriving at Durham University Business School in January 2005.

Consultancy
How trust works can be taught, and the insights gained can have a powerful impact on employee performance. Graham has built up a successful track record in delivering training and consultancy on trust for a wide range of client organisations, including the Swiss bank UBS (at Executive level), Sunderland City Council (for the Executive team, and their Internal Transformation team), and the Richmond Housing Partnership (the entire workforce). Together with the client, Graham creates bespoke workshops pitched at a variety of audiences, and participant feedback confirms the very high standards of delivery and impact of the sessions - recommendations available on request.

He is also a regular speaker at conferences and workshops for the pharmaceutical industry and HR.

Teaching
Graham teaches on the MA [soon-to-be MSc in Management] programmes, including Organisational Behaviour, Human Resource Management and Employee Relations and Reward. He also teaches Management of Change and Leadership for MBA courses worldwide. He has exceptional teaching evaluations.