Ha Hoang, Research Director
Research is one of the fundamental missions of ESSEC professors. The ESSEC Research Center (CERESSEC) defines the institution’s research strategy and oversees its implementation. We ensure that our researchers, more than 160 across seven departments, conduct their work with scientific integrity, ethics, and social and environmental responsibility and have all necessary resources at their disposal, with the ultimate goal of developing and disseminating new knowledge.
ESSEC strives for an institutional culture that favors the creation of high-quality research. Therefore, we recruit early-career and seasoned researchers whose work aligns with ESSEC’s strategic mission from some of the most prestigious academic institutions worldwide. We encourage diversity and experimentation, with all functional areas represented in our faculty, and inclusive of disciplines such as sociology, psychology, applied mathematics, medicine, law, and urban planning. The resources available to ESSEC researchers encourage them to produce impactful, high-quality research that is widely shared with diverse audiences nationally and internationally. We provide incentives and support for publications, workshop organization, faculty exchanges, and academic conference presentations. Our assistance to researchers and their projects also includes budget management, administrative procedures, and technical support for their research.
We also support open-access research and citizen involvement in science, firmly believing that research should be impactful and shared with a broad audience. This concern for sharing knowledge has led us to pursue national and European recommendations on open science and science with and for society. As a result, faculty publications are now available in open access in more than a third of the journals in our journal classification list. Similarly, ESSEC has adopted a science and society policy: one key element is its annual science and society conference. The event brings together renowned academics, political decision-makers, local representatives, senior executives, professors, students, alumni, and citizens, to discuss their visions, commitments, initiatives, and research work around a topical theme.
Our research strategy is to reinforce our presence on the national and international stages regarding our research output and impact. We’ve identified several actions to achieve this goal, including:
- Enhancing research support for faculty
- Increasing fund availability
- Enhancing our research culture on campus
In 2025, faculty will return to a newly renovated Research Green Tower with formal and informal meeting spaces to facilitate conversation and collaboration. The reopening builds on new activities including organizing the Science and Society Conference and Research Day which brings together invited participants and ESSEC researchers to discuss and share their visions, their commitments, their initiatives, projects and research work on a specific and topical theme.
- Establishing international partnerships
- Increasing the visibility of research
We use ESSEC Knowledge, our thought leadership portal, and regularly collaborate with the national and international press to make our research accessible to the general public.
In 2020, we implemented INSPIRE: the Institutional Strategic Program for Improvement of Research at ESSEC, designed to strengthen our productivity, impact, and reputation. As part of this plan, our projects have five major transdisciplinarity themes, centered around one common goal: How the current unprecedented rate of technological, societal, and environmental change affects all the actors, functions, and stakeholders within and around organizations.
The five themes are:
Part of the strategy is to reinforce our presence on the national and international stages regarding our research output and impact. We’ve identified several actions to achieve this goal, including:
-
Enhancing research support for faculty
Increasing fund availability
-
Enhancing our research culture on campus
For instance, from 2023, we are organizing the Science and Society Conference every April, followed by Research Day, a dual research and society event where invited participants, as well as ESSEC researchers, discuss and share their visions, their commitments, their initiatives, projects and research work on a specific and topical theme.
-
Establishing international partnerships
-
Increasing the visibility of research
We use ESSEC Knowledge, our thought leadership portal, and regularly collaborate with the national and international press to make our research accessible to the general public.
Over the last five years, ESSEC faculty have been busy publishing:
- 464 articles in academic journals, including 73 in prestigious excellent rank journals (such as the Journal of Applied Psychology, Journal of Management, Operations Research, Journal of Marketing, MIS Quarterly, and many more)
- 133 book chapters and 20 book editors
- 38 books and organizing over 80 conferences on the ESSEC campuses
In 2023/2024, ESSEC faculty:
- Participated in over 210 conferences, and organized 145 research seminars
- Received 9 awards and honors, receiving a further 4 nominations
- Received funding for 16 research projects in 2023 alone, with 2.1 million euros of funding awarded, includingJean Monnet Chair (Gouvernance Europe) & New chair of excellence (IDS department)
- 50% funded projects led by female researcher
In its 2019 evaluation, the French national agency for research evaluation (HCERES) hailed ESSEC’s “remarkable scientific production”, stating that ESSEC is "one of the top three French leaders in terms of research visibility and recognition".
