PhD Position in Strategic Partnerships and Green Transitions in Port

At the Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, Aalborg University Business School, we invite applications for an ambitious PhD position in business economics focusing on strategic partnerships and green transitions in port ecosystems. The position is open for appointment from 15th October 2026 or as soon as possible thereafter and runs for three years. Your work tasks The PhD project addresses one of the most pressing challenges facing contemporary port ecosystems: how ports can develop new strategic roles in support of the green transition. The project will explore how ports move beyond their traditional functions and develop new strategic roles to become active platforms for collaboration across logistics, energy systems, industrial development, and regional transformation. Ports have traditionally served as critical infrastructure for transport, trade, and logistics. Today, however, concerns related to energy security, electrification, supply chain resilience, and the integration of renewable energy systems are reshaping their strategic importance. In this context, ports are increasingly positioned not only as logistics hubs and industrial ecosystems, but also as energy hubs and arenas for new forms of industrial collaboration. The project is situated against the background of current European policy developments, including the EU Ports Strategy, which emphasizes the need to strengthen the competitiveness, resilience, security, and sustainability of Europe’s ports. These developments provide an important context for understanding the changing expectations placed on ports and the strategic transitions they are expected to navigate. The premise of the project is that the green transition of ports cannot be understood as a question of individual port strategy alone. Rather, ports’ emerging roles as energy hubs, logistics platforms, industrial ecosystems, and regional transition actors depend on strategic partnerships across complex networks of port authorities, energy companies, logistics actors, industrial firms, technology providers, municipalities, and other public and private stakeholders. The aim of the PhD project is to examine how strategic development unfolds in transitioning port contexts, with particular attention to how interorganizational partnerships are developed, organized, led, and sustained in practice. The project will provide the opportunity to study strategic change close to practice and to generate knowledge that is both academically relevant and practically meaningful. The project will explore how collaborations across the value chain emerge, how partnerships are organized and established, and how established ways of working are challenged when ports take on new strategic roles. It will also examine how such transitions are organized and led internally, including how ports build strategic capacity, coordinate across internal functions, and translate new external demands into organizational priorities, practices, and decision-making processes. A central component of the work will be qualitative empirical research. The empirical work will be based on in-depth case studies in the Danish port sector, with particular attention to Port of Aalborg and its surrounding ecosystem. The project is expected to be conducted as engaged scholarship, where research findings are developed in close dialogue with practice and contribute to ongoing strategic conversations, reflection, and learning. The successful candidate will therefore have a unique opportunity to work closely with both academic researchers and practitioners involved in shaping ports as multimodal logistics hubs, industrial ecosystems, and energy platforms in the green transition. The PhD project is expected to contribute to research on strategic management, partnerships, ecosystem collaboration, and green transition. Empirically, the project will provide insight into how ports and their partners work to make new strategic roles operational in practice. Theoretically, it will contribute to understanding how strategic collaborations are developed and governed in transition contexts where future roles, value propositions, and organizational arrangements are not given in advance but must be created across organizational and sectoral boundaries. During the three years of employment, you will be part of the research environment at Aalborg University Business School and contribute to teaching activities amounting to approximately 600 hours. You will also complete PhD courses equivalent to 30 ECTS and undertake an external research stay arranged in agreement with your PhD supervisors. The position offers a strong foundation for developing an academic profile within strategy, sustainability, and transition studies. Your competencies We are looking for a motivated candidate with a relevant master’s degree, for example in organization and management, strategy, supply chain management, innovation studies, business administration, or related social science fields. You should have a strong interest in strategic development, collaboration, and green transition, and be motivated to conduct in-depth empirical research in close interaction with the port sector. Solid qualitative methodological skills are required, and prior experience with qualitative data collection and analysis is considered an advantage. Experience with case study research, interviews, observations, document analysis, or process-oriented research designs will be particularly relevant. We welcome applicants who are curious, analytically strong, and eager to engage with complex real-world transition processes. You are expected to work independently and in a structured manner and to be able to plan and carry out long-term empirical research tasks. You will work closely with Port of Aalborg, where you will have a second workspace, and you should be comfortable engaging with both academic and practice-oriented environments. The ability to navigate these settings is important, as the project involves ongoing interaction with organizations undergoing strategic transition. The successful candidate is expected to contribute actively to the research environment at Aalborg University Business School, share ongoing work, participate in academic discussions, and engage constructively with colleagues and external partners. Proficiency in written and spoken Danish and English is required in relation to teaching, data collection, and collaboration with partners in the Danish port ecosystem. Qualification requirements PhD stipends are allocated to individuals who hold a Master's degree. PhD stipends are normally for a period of 3 years. It is a prerequisite for allocation of the stipend that the candidate will be enrolled as a PhD student at the Doctoral School of Social Sciences and Humanities in accordance with the regulations of Ministerial Order No. 1124 of September 19, 2025 on the PhD Programme at the Universities and Certain Higher Artistic Educational Institutions. According to the Ministerial Order, the progress of the PhD student shall be assessed at regular points in time. As part of the PhD study, you are among other things required to complete PhD courses corresponding to 30 ECTS, gain experience with teaching or other forms of knowledge dissemination and complete an external research stay outside of Aalborg University, preferably 3-6 months at a foreign research institution. PhD candidates must have achieved the grade 10 or above in the Danish grading system (or the equivalent in a different grading system) for their Master’s Thesis/final exam. Please visit the website of the doctoral school for further information on admission requirements. Who we are Aalborg University Business School (AAUBS) is a regionally anchored and internationally oriented business school conducting research and teaching within the broad fields of business administration and economics. As a PhD student you will be affiliated with the research group