Discipline
Entrepreneurship
Supervisor
- Laurel Steinfield
- Zoe Kinias
Azure's research examines how entrepreneurship can both reinforce and challenge systems of exclusion. Her focus is on how marginalized and stigmatized entrepreneurs build networks, access resources, and navigate dominant norms of legitimacy and success. She explores how prevailing logics within entrepreneurial ecosystems exclude those who do not conform to normative ideals, while also investigating
how alternative practices can offer pathways for resistance and redefinition. Azure is passionate about rethinking how value, success, and participation are defined in organizational life, and views research as a means to advance justice and collective well-being.
Education
- PhD Candidate, University of Massachusetts
- BS in Marketing and Liberal Studies Major of Diversity & Society; Minors in Economics and Finance, Bentley University
Research Interests
- Entrepreneurship
- Stigma
- Identity
- Diversity, Equity & Inclusion
Publications
- Cook, A. & Steinfield, L. 2025 (under review). Designing for Equity and
Justice: Integrating Intersectionality Theory into Social Innovation
Processes. The Elgar Companion to Social innovation and the Sustainable
Development Goals.
Awards and Honours
- 2025: Ph.D. Candidacy at University of Massachusetts, Boston2
- 2023 - 2025: Dean’s Fellowship for Doctoral Studies at University of
Massachusetts, Boston - 2019 - 2023: Trustee’s Scholarship
- 2019 - 2023: Women’s Leadership Award
Conferences
- Academy of Management (attended 2023; PDW coordinator 2024; presenter 2025)
- Management & Organizational Behavior Teaching Society (presented 2024)
- European Group for Organizational Studies (presented 2024 and 2025
- Eastern Sociological Society (presented 2025)
- Western Academy of Management (presented 2025)
- All Aboard for Entrepreneurship (presented 2025)
Academic Experience
- Research Assistant at Bentley - 2021-2023
- Ph.D. Student at UMass Boston - 2023-2025
- Research Assistant at UMass Boston - 2023-2024
- Teaching Assistant at UMass Boston - 2024-2025
