The navigational challenges of a blended learning approach to teaching in business and management

This paper contributes an assessment of academic perceptions and agency in relation to blended learning. Digital technology provides management educators with opportunities for new and distinctive learning and teaching models. Qualitative semi-structured interview data gathered from academics from different business specialisms provides the basis for analysis of their reflections about their navigation of blended learning and factors that affect its adoption as a feature of business school pedagogy. Results indicate that academic reflexivity, social interaction, and agency, in dynamic combination, are important to understand and explain academics’ navigation of blended learning as a feature of pedagogy. The article contributes new knowledge about factors that affect the deployment of blended learning in business school contexts. It contributes to theory by extending conceptualization of academic reflexivity and agency. It discusses implications for academics and policy makers who are involved in introducing blended learning in management education contexts. •Business School academics' perspectives about the introduction of blended learning into their pedagogy.•Qualitative thematic analysis of reflexive narratives, academic formation, pedagogic values, and student interaction.•Scope for academic autonomy and agency in teaching practice.•Influence of workload intensity, technology avoidance and institutional systems on academic reflexivity.•Model of academic reflexivity and pedagogic agency.