Simon is a Senior Lecturer in International Relations at the University of East Anglia, a Senior Fellow on Global Cities at The Chicago Council on Global Affairs, a Senior Research Fellow at UCL's City Leadership Initiative, and an Affiliated Professor in International Relations at the Institut Barcelona d’Estudies Internacionales.
His latest book, Global Cities and Global Order (Oxford University Press), won the 2018 European Consortium for Political Research Hedley Bull Prize in International Relations. It was also shortlisted for the 2017 British International Studies Association Susan Strange Book Prize.