Professors Crawford Spence of King’s College London and Laura Empson of Bayes Business School, London, are delighted to host the 8th Professions Fest.

This one-day workshop, which is being held this year at King's College London, is devoted to scholarship on the professions. We will bring together a group of dedicated scholars to present and discuss important research developments.

Following last year’s successful event at Bath, we will also be hosting a half-day workshop for a limited number of PhD students on the 10th June, 12-5PM. This PhD workshop will consist of feedback sessions from senior academics in the area. 

 

Confirmed presentations for Professions Fest (June 11th, 9-5PM):  

 

Louise Ashley (Queen Mary University of London), “Tim-Nice-But-Dim”? How stigmatising the ‘super-posh’ works strategically in elite professional firms.

Stefanie Gustafsson (University of Bath), Co-constructing the illusion of mobility: how boundary work sustains exclusion in elite professions

Sabina Keston-Siebert (University of Glasgow), The Professionalisation of Spy Recruitment

Frida Pemer (Stockholm School of Economics), Professional Services and Gen AI

Andy Sturdy (University of Bristol), The consulting critique and social responsibility: taking the management out of management consultancy?

Justin Waring (University of Loughborough), Role and identity conflict for T-shaped professions: learning from the experiences of geriatricians

Jingqi Zhu (University of Liverpool), The Politicization of Global Professional Service Firms: The Big Four in China

 

Many of these speakers will also be leading sessions in the PhD workshop the day before.

 

Registration

The cost of the event is £70 (including the workshop the day before for those PhDs students whose papers have been accepted for discussion). 

 

PhD Workshop 

PhD students interested in attending on the 10th should send a one-page summary of their PhD work, specifying stage of research, research question, literature and theoretical framing, to crawford.spence@kcl.ac.uk by 15th April 2026.