Fair, constructive, and always motivating.
Dr. Mathew Parackal is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Marketing within the Otago Business School at the University of Otago. He earned his BSc and MSc from Allahabad University, a Postgraduate Diploma from Massey University, and a PhD from Massey University. Parackal's research focuses on the application of technology in marketing, including analytics, big data, and digital communication. He developed a dynamic transactional model of communication for public health messages via social media, earning finalist status in the 2020/21 Business Research Translation Award. Additionally, he pioneered natural language processing applications for marketing phenomena and used supervised machine learning to quantify human values, improving political election predictions when combined with voting intentions. Before entering academia, Parackal drew from a family-business background, working for leading agrochemical firms, managing his own chemical business, and gaining experience in launching new ventures. He continues to assist New Zealand firms in developing business and digital strategies, leveraging his expertise in designing online systems.
In teaching, Parackal delivers undergraduate Sales and Sales Management (MART304) and postgraduate Digital Marketing (MART466), while supervising postgraduate and PhD research on digital communication, branding, sustainability, political elections, and crisis management. Key publications include 'Entrepreneurs’ reaction to a crisis' with Karami et al. (Applied Economics Letters, 2026), 'Effectuation in action: How pre-commitments drive international performance' with Alinasab et al. (International Entrepreneurship & Management Journal, 2026), 'Enhancing new service development effectiveness: The role of customer participation' with Kamali et al. (International Journal of Productivity & Performance Management, 2025), 'Mining brand value propositions on Twitter' with Alwash et al. (2021), and 'The use of Facebook advertising for communicating public health messages' with Parackal et al. (2017). His work extends to public presentations, such as 'Flipped thinking in the age of AI: Rethinking pedagogy in Higher Education' at the University of Otago Learning and Teaching Symposium (2025), contributing to advancements in public health communication, digital marketing, and societal wellbeing.