I am a tenured professor, researcher, and academic leader with interdisciplinary roots in kinesiology and nursing, and more than two decades of experience across higher education, healthcare, fitness, and sport.
Throughout my career, I have been drawn to one enduring question:
How do we create the conditions that allow people to do their best and most meaningful work?
That question has shaped every stage of my career. My early research explored leadership, healthy work environments, structural empowerment, career development, and the work lives of nurses. Along the way, I became increasingly convinced that many of the challenges we attribute to individuals—burnout, disengagement, workforce instability, and declining wellbeing—are often symptoms of how work itself has been designed.
The rapid emergence of artificial intelligence has made these questions even more urgent.
Rather than asking how people can simply work faster or produce more, I am interested in a different challenge: How can we intentionally redesign work, organizations, and our own lives so that people spend more time doing the things that only humans can do?
I believe AI is neither the problem nor the solution. It is a catalyst that challenges us to rethink leadership, work design, education, and what we value as uniquely human. My work explores how evidence-informed leadership, thoughtful systems, and intentional design can help individuals and organizations create greater capacity for meaningful contribution.
Research
My research sits at the intersection of leadership, organizational behaviour, health services, and higher education. I study how leadership decisions, organizational structures, and work design influence individual and collective outcomes, with particular interests in:
- leadership and healthy work environments
- structural empowerment and organizational design
- careers and workforce sustainability
- nursing and health professions education
- meaningful work in the age of AI
Much of my work has been conducted within healthcare and nursing, but the questions increasingly extend beyond any single profession. I am interested in what organizations across sectors can learn about designing environments where people can thrive while making their greatest contribution.
Leadership
My leadership experience includes serving in senior academic leadership roles and as Scientific Director of the Institute for Population Health at the University of New Brunswick. Across these roles, I have worked with interdisciplinary teams navigating complexity, competing priorities, and organizational change.
These experiences have reinforced my belief that leadership is fundamentally about creating the conditions in which people and ideas can flourish—not asking individuals to compensate for systems that were never designed to support them.
Teaching & Mentorship
Teaching has always been one of the most rewarding parts of my career. I teach undergraduate and graduate courses in leadership, research methods, social determinants of health, wellness, and chronic health, and I enjoy helping students connect evidence with practice.
Mentorship is equally important to me. I work closely with graduate students to develop their confidence as scholars, strengthen their research programs, and build meaningful academic careers. I am currently accepting graduate students in the Master of Nursing, Master of Applied Health Services Research, and Interdisciplinary PhD programs.
Writing & Speaking
I write and speak about leadership, organizational design, meaningful work, and the future of knowledge work in an AI-enabled world. My goal is not simply to translate research, but to connect ideas across disciplines and explore how evidence can help us rethink the systems in which we work and live.
Through my writing, speaking, and ongoing research, I hope to contribute to a broader conversation about designing organizations—and lives—that enable people to do more of what only they can do.
Let’s Connect
If you’re interested in collaborating on research, inviting me to speak, exploring organizational challenges, or simply continuing the conversation, I’d be delighted to hear from you.
Emily Read, PhD, RN 