Professor Craig Littler died in September 2010 after having been suddenly taken ill while lecturing at James Cook University (JCU). Craig had joined JCU in early 2009 as Head of its School of Business. 

JCU’s Vice Chancellor, Professor Sandra Harding, said that Professor Littler was a fine scholar with ten books and monographs, and approximately one hundred other publications, but he also brought something different to the universities he served: “His intellect sparkled. I am very glad that Craig Littler came to JCU. He made a difference. He will be sorely missed,” 

His Pro Vice Chancellor at JCU, Professor Robin Woellner, added that Professor Littler had made a profound impact on the University. “He will be remembered for the strong leadership he provided to the School of Business.” 

Craig had moved to JCU from St Andrews University, Scotland. His former Head of School there, Professor Peter McKiernan, commented: “He was a founding professor of the Centre for Business Education in 2002 and helped lay the foundations for its merger with the School of Management two years later. He was one of the School’s high profile professors and was much admired by his students, whom he inspired with dynamic and inspirational teaching in strategic management and organisation studies. He flourished in this top class research environment and continued to publish in highly-ranked journals, so helping to raise the profile of the School in the UK’s 2008 research assessment exercise.” 

Before moving to St Andrews, Craig had been Professor and Director of External and Executive Programs at Royal Holloway College, University of London. His responsibilities included running and developing a suite of corporate education programs, such as the JP Morgan MBA program for senior managers.

Through most of the 1980s and 1990s, Craig worked at several universities in Australia, including as a professor at the University of Southern Queensland, and as a visitor at the University of Melbourne. 


While a senior lecturer at Griffith University, Queensland, in the 1980s, Craig led the team that founded Labour & Industry – A journal of the Social & Economic Relations of Work, which is now based at Monash University and published by the Association of Industrial Relations Academics of Australian and New Zealand (AIRAANZ). He had been active in AIRAANZ and other professional associations, including the Australian & New Zealand Academy of Management (ANZAM), British Academy of Management (BAM) and the British Universities Industrial Relations Association (BUIRA).

Born in Birmingham, UK, Craig studied at the London School of Economics where he gained a BSc and a PhD. He subsequently worked in the UK at Cambridge University; City University, London; and Imperial College. 

In one of the last articles that he wrote while at JCU, Craig encouraged his colleagues to foster research and build a a research community: “…above all we need a sense of ideas-consciousness…. we can recognise that we are always forming hypotheses (‘Does he really like me’), testing them, and making conclusions. Research is no different from self-reflective focussed thinking operating within a set of guidelines…Research is fun, even if it is hard work”.

Craig conducted research in a range of areas including: the Labour Process, the Sociology of Work, Industrial Relations, Human Resource Management, International Management and Strategic Management. His interests included China (long before it was fashionable), Research Methods, Organisational Change, Organisation Theory and the Management of Innovation. He consulted with governmental organisations and companies in Australia, Britain, Japan and USA.


For more than a decade, Craig co-ordinated a research project on organisational restructuring, which involved Australian, New Zealand, South African and US comparisons. Recognised as an expert on corporate downsizing, he presented many papers at international conferences and in Australia he gave an address at the Parliament in the Vital Issues Program for “notable speakers.” 


A well-attended celebration of Craig’s life was held in Townsville on 15 September 2010. He was a well known academic who made a considerable impact on the academic fields in which he worked and will always be remembered by those who knew him. They will recall his wit, insightfulness and his intellectualism. 


One colleague commented to me that he was “very warm hearted, hospitable, and interested in people and their reactions'. Another observed that he was a “colourful and exciting character who did not suffer fools gladly”. He was not afraid to be critical or to constructively challenge others’ assumptions.


Craig is survived by two wives and three children: Dene, with his first wife, Gill Palmer, as well as Nyree and Cassia with his second wife Elizabeth Wickham.


Greg J. Bamber, Monash University

Melbourne, Australia: GregBamber@Gmail.Com


With many thanks for helpful comments to Craig’s family, friends and colleagues.

It is an honour to speak about the Monash University chapter of the life and work of Bill Howard. Unlike June, Joe, Di, Russell and others who knew him from his earliest days, I first encountered him as an undergraduate in the mid-1970s, and we gradually grew on each other.
 
It was only when I heard the sad news that I realised how deeply he had affected me and how much of a lasting impression he had left.

Of course he would be totally embarrassed and probably very disapproving that we are here gathered today to eulogise him. I expect he would have said quite simply: “Aw you shouldn’t have gone to all this trouble”.

Career
Bill started work in the Department of Labour and National Service. He won a Commonwealth Overseas Scholarship which took him to Cornell University where he was awarded a PhD.

In 1966, he came to a lectureship at Monash in the Department of Economics, which was then the centre of industrial relations scholarship in Australia. He later moved across to what is now the Department of Management where he continued to research and teach in industrial relations and labour economics, rising to the position of Associate Professor before his retirement in 1993

He was influential in the development of the industrial relations field at Monash and led it for the last twenty years of his service. While his work showed the influence of his economic training, he strongly believed in the importance of institutions.

Bill taught a variety of subjects at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels. Bill even taught industrial relations in the MBA, and it was these students in particular who appreciated Bill’s grasp of the worlds of business and government. He is fondly remembered by countless students and at a recent 40 year reunion for the Monash MBA, it was Bill whom I was most asked about.

His one liners and his comebacks were so fast that before you had time to respond he’d unleashed yet another quip. But none of it was vicious: sometimes it was called for criticism; often uninvited but useful advice.

Publication
Bill published widely; his most influential piece was the 1977 ‘Trade Unions in the Context of Union Theory’. It was here that he first published what has come to be known as the union dependency thesis. Like many of Bill’s views, I do not know anyone who agreed with it entirely but no one could ignore it. It had to be grappled with. 

Out of curiosity, I googled Bill yesterday and six things came up – not bad for someone who has been out of the trade for 16 years!. Clearly his major works are still being cited.

Before I leave his publication, I want to highlight another feature of his character. Almost invariably, he did not go first author. I am sure that was not for lack of contribution. I can imagine him saying something like: Look...you have done the lion’s share of the work and I wouldn’t feel right about it”.

Individual to the end
Certainly, Bill only published when he had something to say. Although the pressures to publish were there then, captured in the phrase “publish or perish”. He simply would not play the game.

But when he wrote something it was well polished. He wrestled with the arguments – something which seems to happen less and less today. The polishing was not about drafts and re-drafts to find an elegant phrase; these came naturally and often the first draft was close to the final.

Bill could have equally been a novelist or an historian; he loved literature and he drew on it frequently in conversations. And he always had a ready story or anecdote with which to illustrate or drive home his point.

Mentor and Advisort
He always had time to stop what he was doing to provide advice and counsel to a host of friends, students and colleagues. 

From my perspective he was always doling out advice, whether or not I wanted it or agreed with it. At some level it was a provocation as our political views were quite opposed; I am not sure if he was trying to change me or whether he just enjoyed the game.

At the same time as he gave advice he always sought it, even from me, and on things which I had no idea – but Bill gave me credit for knowing far more than I did.

The Departure
But the last word must do to Bill. In 2002 we brought some of the leaders in the field together to provide their reflections on 25 years of Australian industrial relations. Ever incisive, ever humble he wrote in words that have not dimmed:

“Doubtless some of you are thinking about the future of industrial relations. As a spectator, I think that something will have to be done to mend the decline of unionism – self evident like most of my predictions. I do believe that, even if the good old days weer good, yon wont find salvation in the past.

One of the reasons I suggest this, apart from general principles, is the nature of the Industrial Relations Commission. From inception it has tried to be fair (an part of my criticism of the Commission relates to that . I think it is more appropriate for a legislature to dispense fairness). But it doesn’t seem that fairness is something any government of the future is likely to promote. Of course, they will all say they want tob e fair , but they will have an eye on the votes they need”


Professor Julian Teicher

W. A. (Bill) Howard, B. Com, M. Com, PhD. (1930-2009)
  
Bill Howard passed away on 9 August, 2009.
  
He was an outstanding Labour Economist whose focus was on Industrial Relations, for which he gained national and international recognition.  In Australia, he held various university positions, including those of Associate Professor, Economics and Politics (Monash), Council Member (Monash) and Senior Associate (Management and Industrial Relations, Melbourne).  In the U.S.A. - where he had gained his PhD at Cornell - he was a visiting Professor (Wisconson University) and visiting Lecturer/Fellow (John Hopkins and Maryland Universities), Guest Scholar (Brookings Institute) and Fellow of the America Council of Learned Scholars.
  
Bill remained an active researcher and consultant to government and private sector organizations throughout his working career and was widely published.  He was a deep thinker with a razor-sharp mind and a wicked sense of humour.  He was a great admirer of the American system of collective bargaining, which he preferred to the Australian system (his ‘dependency thesis’), with its reliance on government intervention for conflict resolution.  He was generous to a fault in sharing his time, efforts and intellectual insights, to encourage and assist friends, students and colleagues.  He was especially interested in analysing the contributions of those in Industrial Relations, epitomised by Shorty O’Neill, the long time Head of the Barrier Industrial Council (or Workers’ Soviet) in Broken Hill, who dared to ‘buck’ the system.  Although worlds apart, Bill and Shorty proudly shared the ‘maverick’ mantle.

Outside of his careers Bill had been an accomplished junior footballer and was a passionate supporter of the Richmond Football Club as well as a member of the Melbourne Cricket Club.  He was also a lover of traditional American Dixieland jazz music.

Bill’s horizons were, sadly, severely restricted by the necessity to weather serious personal storms, namely the untimely death of his wife, Mary, and the ongoing demands and pressures of raising into adulthood, a seriously disabled child.  His lifelong devotion to his family, especially to his daughters, Ruth and Martha, and granddaughter Rachael, and his son-in-law Steve, is an inspiration to all of us who knew and loved this wonderful ‘one of a kind’ man.

Dr June M. Hearn
Former Deputy Chancellor
Monash University