dr. Katinka Quintelier, MA MSc.

Associate Professor, School of Business and Economics, Management and Organisation

Associate Professor, Amsterdam Sustainability Institute

Personal information

Katinka Quintelier is associate professor of Strategy & Ethics at the department of Management & Organisation (M&O) of VU Amsterdam, and a member of the Amsterdam Sustainability Instititute. She holds a PhD in Philosophy from Ghent University and a PhD in Strategy from the University of Amsterdam. With an interdisciplinary background spanning biology, philosophy, and business administration, her expertise lies in motivating different actors to organize value creation for people and nature.

Katinka’s work focuses on multi-stakeholder interactions that improve nature and society while being financially sustainable. She investigates this in the context of greening buildings, for instance via roofs with native vegetation and solar panels that increase biodiversity, cool buildings, and contribute to the energy transition.

Katinka has publications in journals such as Frontiers in Psychology, Human Nature, Thinking and Reasoning, Journal of Cleaner Production, European Management Journal, and – with many co-authors – PNAS and Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin.

Research

What if improving our natural and social world would be good for business?

The purpose of business is to create value. In her research Katinka investigates how we can use business to create value for nature and people. This work goes to the heart of the circular economy and develops it into a regenerative economy. To advance knowledge, she makes use of theorizing in the fields of stakeholder management, circular business models, regenerative economy and moral psychology.

Katinka’s research methods are transdisciplinary, in the sense that knowledge and insights are co-created with stakeholders in different sectors. This means that business, government, civil society, research & education and nature all sit around the table. Through her work, Katinka brings stakeholders in the built environment together to openly discuss philosophical and strategic questions about business and organizing.

Her research focus is on the construction industry, nature-inclusive cities, and nature-based learning.

Teaching

Katinka teaches courses on the circular economy and on business ethics, for Master students, executives and post-graduates. With her teaching she aims to empower students to craft a career based on their own values, and to think of business sustainability in an inclusive way.

Katinka is involved in Plato’s Garden, a grassroots initiative where teachers develop, study, and implement nature-based learning for sustainability education. She brings students outside the classroom to learn in nature, with nature, and through nature, to grow capacities that are cognitive, affective, and motivational. To further improve her skills for nature-based learning she also became a forest bathing guide.

Ancillary activities