Our Team
A/Professor Ian O’Boyle
Ian O'Boyle PhD, GAICD, is an Associate Professor in management and Director of CERM Performance Indicators at UniSA Business. He is the lead Chief Investigator on this project. Associate Professor O'Boyle is a leading researcher in the area of governance, leadership, and performance management focussed within the sporting context, while as Director of CERM Performance Indicators he leads a highly successful applied research venture that focusses on benchmarking and performance management in the sport and leisure industries.
Associate Professor O'Boyle holds a BSc in sport management, a MSc in sport management, a PhD in performance management, and is a member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors. Associate Professor O'Boyle's current research focusses on collaborative governance, collective leadership, and organisational performance management. Associate Professor O'Boyle's research has been published in leading international journals including Journal of Sport Management, European Sport Management Quarterly, and Sport Management Review.
In recognition of his international reputation for sport governance research, he has been named as a research associate at the renowned Sports Performance Research Institute of New Zealand (SPRINZ). In addition to extensive journal publications, Associate Professor O'Boyle has published research books in the areas of sport governance, leadership, and performance management all with tier one publishing houses.
Associate Professor O'Boyle has engaged with local, national and international industry through his work with state sport organisations, national sport organisations, international governing bodies of sport, and through the extensive list of both private, public, and non-profit sport and leisure entities that are engaged by Associate Professor O'Boyle's work and his leadership of CERM Performance Indicators.
A/Professor Adam Karg
Adam Karg is an Associate Professor and leads the Sport Innovation Research Group in the Swinburne Business School. He completed a Bachelor of Commerce (Hons) and PhD at Deakin University and his main research areas are concerned with sport fan and customer equity, across sport and leisure settings, specifically in membership services related to satisfaction, engagement and organisation-consumer relationships. Additionally, he undertakes research in organisation design, consumer behaviour, sponsorship and branding, analytics and innovation applied to sport.
Adam has published research articles in ranked peer-reviewed sport management and marketing journals and is a co-author of leading textbooks on Sport Marketing and Sport Organisation. He has also been engaged in a range of research and consulting activities with national and state sporting organisations, governing bodies, sport technology start-ups and more than 50 professional sport teams in Australia and overseas. Adam has presented at academic and industry conferences and undertaken workshops for national and overseas audiences and is the current President of the Sport Management Association of Australia and New Zealand (SMAANZ).
Professor Rochelle Eime
Professor Rochelle Eime is the Director of Sport and Recreation Spatial (sportandrecreationspatial.com.au) Federation University and Victoria University, which focuses on investigating sport and recreation participation, facilities and health for evidence-based decision making.
The key areas are:
• Participation levels and trends
• Influences on participation
• Value of sport: the health benefits of participation
• Places to play: the nexus between facilities and participation
Rochelle is a behavioural epidemiologist, who has over 15 years of research experience specifically relating to the sport sector and covering areas of participation, facilities, health and education. She has strong industry networks within the sport and health sector including state and national, government agencies as well as sport and recreation organisations. Her research has won a number of state and national research awards including VicHealth Research into action award, the Parks and Leisure Australia national research award and the Victorian Sport award- sport development of the year. Rochelle has written over 300 peer-review publications, book chapters and industry reports, and has received $5.8 million in research grants including Commonwealth MRFF and ARC Linkage grants
Professor Heath McDonald
Professor Heath McDonald is the Dean of the School of Economics, Finance and Marketing at RMIT University. Heath has a background in consumer research and product management, working mainly with "high involvement" products including sport, charities, wine and the arts. His academic research work has been published in leading journals throughout Europe, North America and Australasia. He has attracted over $2 million in external funding for his research, including over $650,000 of Australian Research Council funding. Recent industry research partners include the Australian Football League (AFL), the Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage and Arts, the Melbourne Victory and Movember.
Having worked with the AFL for many years to improve member retention and satisfaction, Dr. McDonald is currently undertaking a long-term project to build support for the two new AFL teams in Gold Coast and Western Sydney. He is also advising the committee considering the proposed $1 billion development of a new sporting stadium in Perth, assisting the Federal Government to improve public engagement with Australia's heritage and working with a number of charity organisations to increase donor engagement.
Dr Leila Heckel
Dr Leila Heckel holds a BA/MA in Social Work and a PhD in Psychology. She is a Research Fellow at the University of South Australia and has 10 years’ experience in research project management including the coordination of various randomised controlled trials. Leila has a special interest in improving the health and wellbeing of the Australian population and has worked for several years in the field of Psycho-Oncology. Therein, she tested the efficacy of interventions to improve the mental health and wellbeing of cancer patients and their family carers. Leila has a strong interest in utilising technology in health research, particularly for the collection of real-time data and the delivery of interventions. She has designed and tested smartphone applications to support newly diagnosed cancer patients undergoing active treatment and to assist their family members in their caregiver role.
PhD / Masters by Research Candidate
The project is currently recruiting for a PhD or Masters Candidate to join the team, with a scholarship availble to support a program of research within the project. The scholarship is open to Australian and New Zealand Citizens, Permanent Residents of Australia, with the candidate to be based at the University of South Australia.