Dr Tom Reader is a psychologist, and expert on organisational culture. He directs the MSc in Organisational and Social Psychology, and leads the Culture and Risk Research Unit.

Tom’s research investigates how organisations and teams build resilient cultures in which people are good at managing risk, learning from feedback, and innovating when the unexpected happens. Focussing on domains such as healthcare, finance, energy, and aviation, the aim of his research is to generate insights and practical tools that can help organisations prevent harmful failures, and adapt to disruption and change. Increasingly, Tom’s work explores how psychological science and AI can be harnessed to better understand, assess, and improve the culture of organisations.

Tom’s academic background is in Human Factors psychology, and how the design of social and cognitive systems in organisations cause or prevent errors and catastrophic accidents in safety-critical industries. He has a psychology MA and PhD from the University of Aberdeen.

A former Leverhulme research scholar, Tom research has been published in leading scientific journals (see Google Scholar), been funded by research councils, foundations, and corporations, and developed highly impactful tools and interventions (e.g., the Healthcare Complaints Analysis Tool). Tom provides advisory and consulting services to organisations through LSE Consulting, and also directs an LSE executive course on Leading Organisational Culture.