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Prof. Dr. Sabrina Schell

Profile

Prof. Dr. Sabrina Schell Institutsleiterin

Contact

Links

  • Address Berner Fachhochschule
    Business School
    Institut New Work
    Brückenstrasse 73
    3005 Bern

Activities

  • Head of the Institute for New Work

  • New Work
    People & Organisation
    Self-organisation – in particular Holacracy and self-organised teams
    Self-Leadership
    SME and mid-sized company research
    Family business research

Teaching

  • Bachelor Business Administration

  • Master Business Administration

  • Master Entrepreneurship

  • CAS Coaching, Mentoring and Consulting

  • New Ways of Working (Master)

  • Succession and Exit (Master)

  • Transformative Leadership (Master)

Research

  • Human Resource Management

  • Family Business Research

  • Self-organisation – Holacracy

  • Business Succession

  • Holacracy

  • Innovation

  • Sustainability / CSR

CV

  • Sabrina Schell studied German and European Business Law (Diplom) as well as Literary, Cultural and Media Studies (BA, MA) in Germany and Sweden, and subsequently completed her doctorate in Business Administration. During her doctoral studies, she undertook research stays in Switzerland and the USA. She is also a trained systemic coach. After working as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Bern, she joined BFH as a research professor in 2022. In 2023, she completed her Habilitation at the University of Bern. In addition to her position at BFH, she serves as Chair of the Supervisory Board of Neomatic AG (Cologne).
  • Further profiles:
    LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sabrina-schell-284b2496/
    Google Scholar: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=1EzjEFsAAAAJ&hl=de&oi=ao
  • 2012-2016 Research Associate (Doctoral Candidate) University of Siegen
  • 2016 – 2022 Senior Researcher (PostDoc) University of Bern
  • 2017 – present Independent Consultant and Coach sabrinaschell.de
  • 2020 – present Chair of the Supervisory Board Neomatic AG
  • 2006 – 2011 Diplom Business Law University of Siegen
  • 2007 – 2011 Literary, Cultural and Media Studies (Bachelor) University of Siegen
  • 2012 – 2016 Dr. rer. pol. University of Siegen
  • 2011 – 2017 Literary Studies (Master) University of Siegen
  • 2019 – 2020 Systemic Coach IneKo University of Cologne
  • 2016 – 2023 Habilitation University of Bern
  • Professional Teaching Competence for Higher Education, Full Certificate, University of Siegen

Projects

Memberships

  • Academy of Management

  • International Family Business Research Academy

  • Editorial Board Member, Journal of Family Business Strategy

  • European Academy of Management

Awards

Julian; Wolff, Sven; Graffius Michael; Schell Sabrina; Moog, Petra (2021). The Pillars of Family Firm Performance? How Owner Manager's Values impact SEW and Performance. Academy of Management Best Paper Proceedings. https://doi.org/10.5465/AMBPP.2021.51
de Groote, Julia; Schell, Sabrina; Hack, Andreas; Kammerlander, Nadine (2020): Overcoming the similarity-complementarity dilemma in open innovation partnerships, Academy of Management Annual Meeting (AOM), Vancouver, Canada, Academy of Management Best Paper Proceedings.
Schell, Sabrina; de Groote Julia; Hack, Andreas; Kammerlander, Nadine (2018): We are family!? Disentangling the owner family in family businesses. Academy of Management Annual Meeting (AOM), Chicago, USA. Academy of Management Best Paper Proceedings.

Family Business Research Strategic Interest Group. European Academy of Management (EURAM), Lisbon, Portugal

Read, Debora; Schell, Sabrina; Hack Andreas (2025): On the edges of civic wealth creation: From entrepreneurial spark to civic stewardship. KSG Entrepreneurship Research Award. G-Forum 2025.

Schell, Sabrina; Bischof, Nicole (2019): Holacracy as a solution for the VUCA World? Learnings from a radically self-organized organization system. European Academy of Management (EURAM), Lisbon, Portugal

Schell, Sabrina; Fröhlich Julia K.; Moog Petra; Hack, Andreas (2015): Die Auswahl eines Unternehmensnachfolgers: Ein Signaling Game? Konferenz der deutschsprachigen Forschungszentren und Institute für Familienunternehmen 2015, Friedrichshafen, Deutschland

Schell, Sabrina; de Groote Julia; Hack, Andreas; Kammerlander, Nadine (2018): Disentangling the concept of the owner family in family business (research). European Academy of Management (EURAM), Reykjavik, Iceland

Language skills and intercultural knowledge

  • English - Full professional proficiency
  • German - Native or bilingual proficiency
  • United States of America
  • Sweden
  • Germany