Michael C. Jackson (BA (Oxon), Ph.D (Hull), CITP, MA (Lancs), FBCS FORS, FCMI F.Cyb.S), born 1951, is Professor of Management Systems and Dean of Hull University Business School. After studying Politics, Philosophy and Economics at Oxford University, he spent 4 years in the civil service before returning to academic life. He has since studied and taught at Lancaster, Warwick, Lincoln and Hull Universities, being appointed a full professor in 1989. Professor Jackson is a past President of the UK Systems Society, the International Federation for Systems Research and the International Society for the Systems Sciences. He has also served on the Council of the Operational Research Society. He is a Fellow of the British Computer Society, the Chartered Management Institute, The Cybernetic Society and the Operational Research Society. He is a Visiting Professor at the Indian Institute of Technology (New Delhi) and an Honorary Professor at the Universidad Ricardo Palma, Lima, Peru.

Professor Jackson is pre-eminent as a researcher in systems and management science, having written 4 highly regarded books and edited 6 others. He has published over 70 articles in refereed journals including Journal of Management Studies, Omega, Journal of the Operational Research Society, Systems Research, Systems Practice, SCOS, Journal of Information Systems, International Journal of General Systems, International Journal of Information Management, Kybernetes, System Dynamics Review, Organization. Professor Jackson edits Systems Research and Behavioral Science, John Wiley, and is on the editorial board of 5 other journals. He has, over the past 3 years, delivered plenary addresses at 18 international conferences. In 1997 he was an Erskine Scholar at the University of Canterbury, New Zealand. Professor Jackson has undertaken many consultancy engagements with outside organisations, both profit and non-profit. These assignments have included the introduction of systems thinking into British Telecom at the senior management level; the development of IT strategy with PA Management Consulting Group; a national project to design evaluation systems for Councils for Voluntary Service; evaluation work with Humberside Training and Enterprise Council; and a study of organisational change in prisons.

Professor Jackson has received research grants from the EPSRC, ESRC, Leverhulme Trust, British Council, The European Union, from organisations in the private and public sector, etc. He has supervised 17 PhD students to successful completion, examined 15 others including from Norway, South Africa, Hong Kong and India, and has conducted PhD workshops in Australia and South Africa. He has been referee of research grant applications for the ESRC, EPSRC and South Africa Foundation for Research Development. He has refereed book proposals for Wiley, Plenum, Pitman, Sage and Routledge, and papers for numerous journals.

Professor Jackson's most recent book is entitled Systems Thinking: Creative Holism for Managers (Wiley), 2003.