Elizabeth has recently retired from UCL, London Centre for Leadership in Learning where she was a senior lecturer. One of her roles had been the development and leadership of an MBA in Educational Business Leadership (International). Prior to this, she was a founder member of the International Educational Leadership Centre, Lincoln University, joining in 1995 as the senior administrator after spending 15 years as a chief operating officer in industry. In 1997 she was appointed as a researcher, investigating and publishing on the role of bursars in schools. During that period she also took part in an evaluative study of effective bursars for the Teacher Training Agency. In 2000 she was appointed Director of School Business Management Development, a role which included leading and revalidating the MBA in Education Management for Education Business Managers and working with the National Bursars Association as Director of the Professional Development Certificates in School Bursarial Studies.

Elizabeth has worked with, and was seconded to, the National College for School Leadership (NCSL) to co-design, develop, co-author and pilot the Certificate of School Business Management for school bursars. She then developed and piloted the Diploma of School Business Management programme. She has been a member of Manchester Metropolitan University and Serco Education and Children’s Services’ writing teams for the Advanced Diploma of School Business Management and the School Business Directors programmes. She was also a DSBM facilitator for Serco Education and Children’s Services.

Elizabeth has also been a member of the Training and Development Agency’s, School Business Managers’ Development Group. For 12 months she worked with the TDA as a School Business Management Consultant, developing materials, collecting data and presenting at conferences. She is currently a member of the DfE’s School Business Professionals interest group.

Elizabeth has been researching school business managers in a longitudinal study, since 1997. She was the principal researcher on the first indicative case-study of school bursars and then designed and carried out the first national survey on school bursarship in 1999. She has completed follow-up surveys in 2003/4 and 2006/7 as an element of base-line research into school business management for the National College for School Leadership (NCSL). She also researched how students on the MBA in Education Management for School Bursars responded and contributed to the learning programme and their own professional development. More recently, she contributed to the ISBL School Business Professional Workforce Survey Report, 2020.

Elizabeth is co-author of the first book on school business managers – From Bursar to School Business manager – and has published papers and chapters in books as well as presented nationally and internationally at research and professional conferences on school business management.