The project team

Dr. Charlotte obtained her PhD in Applied Social Psychology with a specialization in Organizational Psychology in 2008 from the University of Windsor in Canada. She is an Associate Professor of Organizational Behavior and the Chairperson of the Management, Marketing and Entrepreneurship track at the Olayan School of Business, American University of Beirut (AUB). She is currently the Director of the KIP Project on Gender and Sexuality. Her research in cross-cultural organizational behavior and management adopts a multilevel, multi-method and multidisciplinary perspective to broadly examine gender within the Arab Middle East and other developing economies. In particular, she is interested in examining the intersection of gender-related issues, management of organizational behavior and corporate responsibility with regard to opportunities for workplace, socio-economic, and national development. Charlotte is an executive board member of the Evidence-Based Healthcare Management Unit (EHMU) at AUBMC, and a board member of the Arab Foundation for Freedoms and Equality (AFE).

Zeina Mhaidly has a Bachelor's degree in Business Administration/ Human Resources with a Minor Degree in Psychology. She is currently the KIP Project Coordinator at the American University of Beirut. Ms. Zeina Mhaidly has previous work experience in the humanitarian sector where she worked on the empowerment of Syrian Refugees through the organization of Vocational Trainings. She also worked with the Ministry of Education and Higher Education and several parties involved in the public education sector on a school rehabilitation and teacher development project (D-RASATI). Ms. Mhaidly was also the founder and president of the AUB “non-discrimination” club back in 2013 that aimed at raising awareness on campus around discrimination related to gender, sexuality, disability, and race.

Heather holds an MA in media studies from the American University of Beirut, where she studied the emerging visibility of characters coded as homosexual in Lebanese musalsalat. Before joining the KIP Project as Communications Coordinator, she has worked on research which examined social change in theory and practice in the Arab region. She has worked in the journalism and editorial fields in Lebanon, the US, and Austria, writing for newspapers and seminar programs and serving as editor-in-chief Outlook, the university newspaper at AUB. Upon graduating from her MA, she won the Abdul Hadi Debs Endowment Award for academic excellence and demonstration of research capabilities. Heather is planning on pursuing her PhD in gender or media studies, developing her research on the symbolic function of deviance in the construction of the nation and the political potential of “negative” affect for the development of alternative paradigms and frameworks to emerge.