Professor Catherine Burns talks to SharonTodd (CPE) about her experiences with system design and AI systems in health.

Catherine M. Burns is Professor in Systems Design Engineering at the University of Waterloo, Canada and Associate Vice President, Health Initiatives at the Office of Research at the University of Waterloo.

In her past administrative roles she has been engaged with institutional and tri agency funding programs, research partnerships, Waterloo’s equity in research action plan, and research computing.

Catherine was the founder of the Centre for Bioengineering and Biotechnology at Waterloo and led the centre from a faculty to an institutional centre over 8 years. In 2020 she chaired Waterloo’s Health Initiatives Task force to develop a health strategy in response to Waterloo’s 2025 Strategic Plan. In her role as AVP, Health Initiatives she is responsible for advancing Waterloo research in health and health technology. Catherine holds a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Human Factors and Healthcare Systems, has contributed over 300 publications and is the co-author of seven books and the PI on an NSERC CREATE Training program in biomedical technology and entrepreneurship which has trained over 40 graduate students from various faculties across campus.

This educational podcast is brought to you by the Human Factors and Ergonomic Society of Australia. If you like this podcast please make us your favourite on your podcast app.

If you want to find out more about Human Factors and Ergonomics or if you have a question about this podcast please go to the HFESA website ergonomics.org.au and make your request via our contact page. We will be back with more episodes soon!

Sharon Todd is chatting to Adjunct Professor Kate Conroy one of the HFESA's Keynote speakers at our annual conference in Brisbane this year.

Dr Kate Conroy is a specialist in building trustworthy, ethical, and assured robotics, autonomous systems, and artificial Intelligence (RAS-AI) systems in both military and civilian domains. Dr Conroy works in AI Safety and Assurance Queensland Government and is Responsible AI Lead Royal Australian Air Force. With a PhD in philosophy from Rutgers University, specialising in epistemology, cognitive science and applied ethics, she is also Adjunct Professor at QUT Centre for Robotics and Associate Professor Human-centred computing at the University of Queensland. She speaks today in her personal capacity.

This educational podcast is brought to you by the Human Factors and Ergonomic Society of Australia. If you like this podcast please make us your favourite on your podcast app.

If you want to find out more about Human Factors and Ergonomics or if you have a question about this podcast please go to the HFESA website ergonomics.org.au and make your request via our contact page. We will be back with more episodes soon!

Kath Jones is chatting to Dr John Chan about Burnout.

Dr. John Chan is the managing director at Infinite Potential, an independent not-for-profit think tank that develops high-quality, rigorous research, evaluation, and practical solutions to address some of the most pressing workplace problems. An Industrial/Organisational psychologist with 20+ years of global experience designing people strategies to transform how we work and our relationship with work.

As a thought leader in the leadership, burnout and workplace sustainability space, John is a passionate advocate of making structural changes to create long-term impact, amplifying the voices and concerns of minorities and under-represented populations, and rethinking the workplace as a haven that nourishes us, rather than drains us.

This educational podcast is brought to you by the Human Factors and Ergonomic Society of Australia. If you like this podcast please make us your favourite on your podcast app.

If you want to find out more about Human Factors and Ergonomics or if you have a question about this podcast please go to the HFESA website ergonomics.org.au and make your request via our contact page. We will be back with more episodes soon!

Kath Jones is chatting to Professor Anjum Naweed one the the keynote speakers at the HFESA conference in Brisbane in November this year about Simulation and AI.

Professor Anjum Naweed is from the Appleton Institute for Behavioural Science in South Australia—the Adelaide-based campus of CQUniversity.

Anjum is a Certified Professional Ergonomist with a background in psychology and expertise in human factors and systems thinking. He has over 15 years of experience across a range of industry sectors and occupational settings.

Anjum’s research has received many accolades in recognition of his excellence in research activity, publication, and engagement and he has twice received the Vice-Chancellor’s Award for Outstanding Researcher of the Year (2013; 2018) at his university.

He currently serves a Scientific Editor for Applied Ergonomics, an international journal aimed at ergonomists and all those interested in applying ergonomics and human factors in the design, planning and management of technical and social systems at work or leisure. He has been a Scientific Convenor for the Australasian Simulation Congress on five consecutive occasions, and for the Annual HFESA Conference twice.

This educational podcast is brought to you by the Human Factors and Ergonomic Society of Australia. If you like this podcast please make us your favourite on your podcast app.

If you want to find out more about Human Factors and Ergonomics or if you have a question about this podcast please go to the HFESA website ergonomics.org.au and make your request via our contact page. We will be back with more episodes soon!

Sharon Todd and Professor Mark Young the current President of the CIEHF discuss his work in automated transport and the Think Human project to be launched in the midlands of the UK.

Professor Mark Young is Professor of Human Factors in Transport within the Transportation Research Group at the University of Southampton and current President of the Chartered Institute of Ergonomics and Human Factors (CIEHF). Mark has nearly 30 years’ experience working in human factors across transport modes in both academia and industry. Before joining the University of Southampton in June 2023, Mark spent 11 years working as an Inspector at the Rail Accident Investigation Branch, applying his human factors expertise to the investigation of railway incidents and accidents. Prior to this Mark undertook a six-month fellowship at UNSW in Australia with Prof Jason Middleton in 2004 as well as later completing a visiting post at Curtin Monash University with Prof Lynn Meuleners in the early 2010s.Mark has written over 70 peer-reviewed journal papers and five books, he is a Chartered Ergonomist and a Fellow of the CIEHF.

For more background or to connect with Mark, go to:

https://www.southampton.ac.uk/people/62gmgv/professor-mark-young

This educational podcast is brought to you by the Human Factors and Ergonomic Society of Australia. If you like this podcast please make us your favourite on your podcast app.

If you want to find out more about Human Factors and Ergonomics or if you have a question about this podcast please go to the HFESA website ergonomics.org.au and make your request via our contact page. We will be back with more episodes soon!

Sharon Todd is chatting to Chris Fitzgerald about his practical application of Ergonomics and Humans factors to minimise injury risk.

Chris Fitzgerald is a passionate Certified Professional Ergonomist whose career emphasis has been on facilitating meaningful and durable improvement in the design of work. His original career was in Prosthetics and Orthotics, but after 5 years of working in clinical environments, he transferred to Ergonomics to work in occupational settings and has operated his own consulting business, Risk and Injury Management Services, since 1993.

A feature of Chris’s work has been the measurement of human activity in workplaces. This has involved quantifying force exertion in complex environments, the use of EMG to understand patterns of muscle activity and the utilisation of a whole-body system of 17 movement sensors to define the physical requirements of work tasks.

Chris has been fortunate to work across a diverse range of industries and has developed specific expertise within emergency services (fire and ambulance), red meat processing, disability support services and the television industry to name a few. Chris’s work in ambulance design extended to his role for 8 years as the Head of Ergonomics for the Emergency Medical Services Safety Foundation, a not-for-profit organisation based in New York, USA. The Foundation had a global reach with involvement across North America, Europe and Asia, and actively promoted new approaches to the design of ambulances and methods of patient and equipment handling for paramedics.

More recently Chris has gone back to his prosthetics roots where he has just completed a 3-year project in Indonesia, Timor Leste and Cambodia, with RMIT University in Melbourne. This project involved overseeing the implementation of a novel way of casting the transtibial residual limb of amputees using water pressure that resulted in a 60% efficiency gain for casting, manufacture and fitting and delivered a remarkable 96% approval rating from recipient amputees.

Chris’s current focus is on his role as a change leader within the Australian red meat processing industry where he is leading the industry’s selective introduction of exoskeletons.

This educational podcast is brought to you by the Human Factors and Ergonomic Society of Australia. If you like this podcast please make us your favourite on your podcast app.

If you want to find out more about Human Factors and Ergonomics or if you have a question about this podcast please go to the HFESA website ergonomics.org.au and make your request via our contact page. We will be back with more episodes soon!

Sharon Todd is chatting to Adam Scott, the Director of Cardiac Sciences at the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital. Adam has a PhD in Cardiac Medicine, from the University of London, Imperial College in the UK. Adam is an Adjunct Professor at QUT and is the Founder and Chairman of the White Cloud Foundation. He is passionate about creating solutions for problems in the health sector that have previously not been able to be solved. In doing so, he has created a Robotic Ultrasound solution to enable patients in regional/rural areas to access same day ultrasound procedures. At the White Cloud Foundation, he developed the Tele-Mental Health service which has removed the barriers to accessing mental health treatment. In 2024, his efforts were recognised when he was announced as a finalist for the Qld Australian of the Year.

Adam declares he is a Director of RMI Oceania, which is the company that has developed the Robotic Ultrasound solution.

This educational podcast is brought to you by the Human Factors and Ergonomic Society of Australia. If you like this podcast please make us your favourite on your podcast app.

If you want to find out more about Human Factors and Ergonomics or if you have a question about this podcast please go to the HFESA website ergonomics.org.au and make your request via our contact page. We will be back with more episodes soon!

Kath Jones from the HFESA is chatting to Tim Bentley about Mental Health Awareness, respect and safety.

Professor Tim Bentley is an experienced research leader with more than two decades in research and academic leadership roles. Tim joined the School of Business and Law at Edith Cowan University as Professor of Work and Wellbeing in 2019, and in 2023, took up the position of Director of the ECU Mental Awareness, Respect and Safety (MARS) Centre. The MARS Centre was created as part of a multi-million-dollar partnership between ECU and the State Government. As both MARS Centre Director and Mining Work Health and Safety (WHS) Professorial Chair, Tim leads a program of research, teaching and engagement designed to elevate mining sector WHS capability and to move the dial on sector culture towards greater respect and safety.

Prior to joining SBL, Tim’s New Zealand-based roles included Director of the New Zealand Work Research Institute and Auckland University of Technology’s Future of Work Program; Director of Massey University’s Healthy Work Group; and Director of the Centre for Human Factors and Ergonomics at Forest Research in New Zealand. Tim is also a former Editor-in-Chief of the Cambridge University Press publication, Journal of Management & Organization, and has served as Scientific Editor for the Elsevier international publication, Applied Ergonomics.

Tim’s impactful research primarily focuses on psychosocial risk, workplace bullying, and new ways of working, and he is passionate about creating healthy work for the advancement of organisational and employee wellbeing. Tim’s research has been supported by almost AU$9M of external funding from government and industry within New Zealand and Australia, while his published research is extensive and has received considerable scholarly attention.

This educational podcast is brought to you by the Human Factors and Ergonomic Society of Australia. If you like this podcast please make us your favourite on your podcast app.

If you want to find out more about Human Factors and Ergonomics or if you have a question about this podcast please go to the HFESA website ergonomics.org.au and make your request via our contact page. We will be back with more episodes soon!