CEPAR Chief Investigator Sharon Parker has been named Scientist of the Year in the Western Australian (WA) Premier’s Science Awards as one of two joint winners.
The category recognises outstanding individuals for their excellence in a field of science, scientific research or technological advancement who have been active in their field, particularly in the past 10 years.
The average person spends 90,000 hours working in their life, and this is increasing as the population ages. Poor quality work causes burnout, injury, family breakdown, and even premature mortality for people, as well as reduced productivity. Good work design helps individuals, teams, and organisations to thrive.
John Curtin Distinguished Professor Sharon Parker is helping to improve work quality across the globe through world-leading research on work design, which she is then directly applying in Western Australia. Professor Parker led a landmark study into mental health and workplace culture in the Western Australian mining industry, and advises health, aged and disability care organisations, amongst others.
Sharon Parker is an Australian Research Council Kathleen Fitzpatrick Laureate Fellow and a John Curtin Distinguished Professor at Curtin University. Her research areas include work design, organisational change, proactivity, job performance, intervention studies, aging in the workplace, and employee mental health/well-being. She is Director of the Centre for Transformative Work Design; Stream Lead for CEPAR’s Mature Workers in Organisations Research Stream; and lead Chief Investigator on the Design for Care project, amongst others.
The WA Premier's Science Awards recognise outstanding research and engagement taking place in Western Australia's science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) sector.
Alongside Sharon Parker, internationally renowned clinical researcher Professor Markus Schlaich was jointly named Scientists of the Year in this year’s Premier’s Science Awards.