Ashling Turner-Derksen is a lecturer at the Organization Science department at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.
Her research interests focus on belonging and identity in organizations, and on the implementation of artificial intelligence (AI) and its impact on work practices and relationships between human and non-human actors. She is interested in how people construct and negotiate their identities within and across organizations, and how technologies such as AI shape experiences of competence and connection. Her work approaches questions of belonging as an active process, particularly in contexts where belonging is not taken for granted.
As a qualitative researcher, she has expertise in ethnographic methods, including semi-structured interviews, (non-)participant observation, and focus groups. Her research is informed by an international background and sustained engagement with culture, language, and meaning making in everyday organizational life.
She is currently involved in a research project in a healthcare setting that studies the integration of an AI app with a generative chat function into home-based rehabilitation. The project brings together patients, caregivers, healthcare professionals, and software developers to better understand how such technologies can be designed to support care practices.
