Meet our visitor, Associate Professor Deb Powell

It is a pleasure and a privilege to have hosted Associate Professor Deb Powell from the University of Guelph, Canada!

Deb visited FOWI as part of her sabbatical to collaborate with Associate Professor Pat Dunlop at FOWI, with the two sharing similar research interests on personnel selection.

FOWI researchers also had the opportunity to listen to her presentation on 'Understanding Interview Anxiety: Causes and Consequences', including its correlation with interview performance and job performance.

⭐️Tell me a bit about yourself?

I am an associate professor from the University of Guelph. I do research on personnel selection tools, such as employment interviews, and over the past 5 years I’ve focused my studies on interview anxiety, self-presentation tactics in interviews, and biases in interview ratings. I have had a grant about interview anxiety for the past 5 years, which is now coming to an end. I am on sabbatical this year, and am planning my next grant.

⭐️What are you doing at CTWD / FOWI?

I am at FOWI on my sabbatical from the University of Guelph, and I’m here primarily to collaborate with Pat Dunlop, writing a grant about designing selection tools to improve the candidate experience.

⭐️ How did you find the experience?

It was a fantastic experience. I really enjoyed the seminars, and getting to know other researchers from FOWI, and other visiting researchers. And, I’ve really enjoyed exploring Perth. Overall, I found this a very positive work environment.

⭐️What does the future of work look like to you?

I think the future of work is going to be more flexible in terms of time and place. After having to work at home during the pandemic, businesses are going to need to be more flexible in terms of the physical locations where work gets done and the specific hours that people work, However, one challenge with people working when and where they want will be maintaining trust and collegiality within workplaces.

⭐️If you were a book or a movie, what would it be?

Bridget Jones's Diary

⭐️One thing not many people know about you?

I love running, and I’ve really enjoyed running along coastline while in Perth. I’ve also been doing Parkrun events here on Saturday mornings.