About Oliver

I am a researcher, educator, consultant and speaker with research interests and expertise in a wide range of interdisciplinary areas: intergenerational public goods and environmental economics; the evolution of cooperation and altruism; inequality and poverty reduction; and EDI and sustainability leadership.

I am a Professor of Economics at the University of Exeter, where I am also Deputy Director for Business & Policy (and formerly interim Co-Director) of the Institute for Data Science and Artificial Intelligence. In addition, I am a Faculty Affiliate at Harvard University's Sustainability, Transparency and Accountability Research Initiative, and a UKRI Future Leaders Fellow leading the ambitious £1.4m BIG IDEAs project, focused on testing interventions towards more equality in the workplace using randomised controlled trials.

As a faculty affiliate of the Centre for Leadership at the University of Exeter, I also advise and work with a wide range of leaders and organisations: I serve as a member on the UK Cabinet Office’s Evaluation and Trial Advice Panel, academic advisor to behavioural science consultancy MoreThanNow, as an academic affiliate of the Behavioural Insights Team (“Nudge Unit”), and as an advisory board member of MeVitae. I currently also serve as Vice-Chair of the BBC Children in Need’s South West Advisory Committee.

Previously, I taught and researched at the Harvard Business School, Harvard Kennedy School of Government and Harvard Extension School. I have held fellowships at the Alan Turing Institute, the Harvard Behavioral Insights Group and Harvard Women and Public Policy Program. I earned my Ph.D. in Biology from Harvard University and my B.Sc. in Physics from the University of Innsbruck.

My research has been published in leading academic journals such as Nature, PNAS, Nature Human Behaviour, Nature Communications, Science Advances, The Leadership Quarterly, and Environmental and Resource Economics. I have also translated the findings of this research into writings for senior leaders and managers in the Harvard Business Review. My research has also drawn attention from news outlets such as the Forbes, Bloomberg, Huffington Post, Vox, Slate, Yahoo, The Conversation, and VICE. If you want to find out more about my research, click here.

As an educator and researcher, I have received several awards and prizes, including Pacific Standard's "30 Top Thinkers Under 30" award, the Wharton People Analytics research competition prize, the Harvard University Richard J. Herrnstein Dissertation Prize, the Harvard John Parker Award, the Euregio Young Researcher Award, and several Certificates of Distinction in Teaching.

If you are interested in learning more about my research or about consulting for your business, please feel free to reach out at o.hauser@exeter.ac.uk.