Dr Patricia Shewell is Senior Lecturer, a Programme Manager for Bachelor of Commerce Honours in Management Accounting and the Academic Leader for Teaching and Learning in the School of Accounting Economics and Finance. She holds a Bachelor of Commerce, a Bachelor of Commerce Honours in Accounting Sciences, a Postgraduate Diploma in Management Accounting, a Master of Technology in Management Accounting and a PHD in Leadership Studies.
Dr Shewell is an emerging expert in the changing role of the finance and accounting professional in business, as well as in performance measurement of the finance function. This is evident in her Masters dissertation titled: “Finance function – Leveraging a source of competitive advantage for selected South African companies in KwaZulu-Natal”. As well as her PhD thesis titled: “Towards value adding performance: A finance function performance metric for the South African Freight Forwarding industry” which are both relevant as they form a backdrop to her areas of scholarship to date.
Dr Shewell has presented work at three local conferences related to the changing role and focus of the finance function in business. In addition, having identified Data Envelopment Analysis(DEA) as a method of evaluating performance of other business support units, the potential value of DEA as a tool for evaluating relative performance of finance functions was recognised in her PhD.
Dr Shewell has published two papers related to this research. The first, which has been cited by 26 international scholars, critically examines the DEA literature and specifically its application to business support units (cited by 26 international scholars). The second, presents the findings of an application of DEA to the finance function, which work was also presented at a local and at an International conference. She has fully completed professional qualifications with the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA), and is a Associate Cost and Management Accountant (ACMA) and Chartered Global Management Accountant (CGMA).
Dr Shewell is also a member of the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants
