Apart from the MCom degrees conferred, four students also received their PhD degrees. Dr Nasima Carrim received the PhD (Industrial and Organisational Psychology) degree. The title of the thesis was “Who am I?” - South African Indian women managers’ struggle for identity: escaping the ubiquitous cage”. The thesis examined how some Indian women in South Africa who became managers negotiated their identities in their early lives and in their adult working lives on their journeys to becoming successful managers. The study uses a life-story approach to provide a holistic understanding of the first significant cohort of Indian women’s journeys to ascend to management positions in South Africa.

The findings of the study enrich and extend the identity literature relating to ethnic minority women by focusing on identity negotiation over time, rather than only on discrete moments in time. Recommendations regarding future research in this exciting field of study are addressed. The supervisor for this study was Prof Stella Nkomo of the Department of Human Resource Management.

The second candidate to receive a PhD (Organisational Behaviour) degree is Dr Preven Naidoo. The thesis was entitled “The development of a scale to measure perceptions of the advanced automated aircraft training climate”. In his study, he quantitatively explored the phenomena associated with South African aviators’ experiences with training to operate technologically advanced aircraft. The primary purpose of the study was to identify the major factors and subsequent dimensionality of the main research construct. The results of the study greatly enhance the present understanding of the dimensionality of the advanced aircraft training climate and subsequent flight deck behaviour. The supervisors were Prof Leo Vermeulen, extraordinary professor in the Department of Human Resourse Management, and Prof Pieter Schaap, also of the Department of Human Resource Management.

Dr Jean Henry Cooper, who obtained the PhD (Industrial Psychology) degree, is a previous staff member of the Department of Human Resource Management. He currently teaches qualitative research methods and organisational psychology at the Chicago School for Professional Psychology. He is also an active member of the Chicago Center for the Study of Groups and Organisations (CCSGO) and the International Society for the Psychoanalytic Study of Organisations (ISPSO). In his thesis, entitled “The forces involved in being a member of a small group”, he explored, from a postfoundationalist perspective, what it means to be a member of a small group. With his study he developed a framework that can be used by group members to reflect on the way that they are being members of the groups that they belong to. Groups and teams can also use the framework to reflect on the underlying forces impacting their members.

During his honours studies, Jean received the Institute of People Management merit award for the most eminent postgraduate student. He obtained an MCom (Human Resource Management) and an MPhil (Applied Theology) cum laude from the University of Pretoria. The supervisor for his doctoral studies was Prof Johan Basson of the Department of Human Resource Management.

Dr Petrus Leonard Steenkamp received the PhD (Organisational Psychology) degree. In his thesis, entitled “A meaningful workplace: from theory development to applicability”, he developed a model and supporting theory to expand the current thinking on the construct ‘a meaningful workplace’. The study contributed to the field of organisational behaviour by providing sufficient indications that the construct ‘meaningful workplace’ is an emerging construct in the literature on organisational and behavioural theory. It also opens new avenues for the study of human behaviour in modern enterprise. The supervisor of this study was also Prof Johan Basson.