Seven research projects under way

The Reinventing Work chair was created in December 2019, in partnership with BNP Paribas. Several ambitious research projects have already been launched, studying the impact of flexibility, telepresence, digitalization or artificial intelligence on management and HR practices. The Covid-19 pandemic has led us to approach these topics differently, with a specific focus on hybrid management.

Research projects are conducted in different contexts - national, international, in-house at BNP Paribas - and can be extended to other companies. By bringing together academics and professionals, the chair facilitates renewed theoretical and practical views of these key topics.

“This partnership allows us to benefit from exceptional research fields and high-level research teams. It really fosters creativity and innovation,” says Frederic Thoral, Human Resources Director at BNP Paribas Personal Finance. For the past year, all BNP Paribas Personal Finance managers have changed their management mode into an hybrid one, and a reflection on new managerial as well as our new ways of working models, will be launched for 2021. Ultimately, “this partnership helps us to speed up our company’s transformation through research,” he adds.

The chair’s scientific director, professor Emmanuelle Léon, is as enthusiastic about these projects now as she was when the chair was launched, in December 2019: “What we have been experiencing in 2020 underlines the importance of better understanding the transformation of our work experience,” she explains. “To reflect on the evolution of skills in the face of the development of flexibility, agility, digitalisation, to rethink the work-life balance, analyse the role of algorithms in HR processes... The subjects are fascinating and I am delighted at the prospects offered by this chair to explore them in depth.”

Find out more about the research projects in these videos:

Reshaping the work experience

Measuring the paradox of flexible working

Telepresence robots and face time

Human resources and digitalization

Artificial intelligence and recruitment

Managing new work relationships

Personal organization at work

Campuses