Design for Care
Designing better work for the Healthcare and Social Assistance (H&SA) industry
Our mission is to improve the well-being of H&SA employees through the co-creation of SMART work design interventions.
About us
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Design for Care is a research project aimed at developing and assessing work design interventions to create mentally healthy work in the NSW healthcare and social assistance (H&SA) industry. The project is led by Professor Sharon Parker at Curtin University’s Centre for Transformative Work Design, with Professors Anya Johnson & Helena Nguyen at the University of Sydney, and Professor Alex Collie at Monash University. The project is supported by a team of research and professional staff across the three universities, and is funded by icare NSW.
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We collaborate with multiple organisations in the aged care, disability care, and out-of-home care sectors to co-create mentally healthy workplaces. Together, we're working to understand how work design can be leveraged as an intervention to prevent psychological injury (e.g., burnout).
Our approach
We focus on prevention and sustainability
The Design for Care Program seeks to prevent psychological injury by identifying SMART work design opportunities and challenges in collaboration with individuals, teams, and team leaders in the Health Care and Social Assistance industry.​​
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Sustainability is about building the work design capabilities in individuals, teams, team leaders, and organisations to continue to co-create mentally healthy workplaces.
Leading Work Design Change Masterclass Series
Cohort 1 starting October 2026
The Leading Work Design Change Masterclass Series is a facilitated program that supports HR, People & Culture, Work Health & Safety, and Organisational Development professionals, as well as senior managers, to take actions on work design challenges or psychosocial risks, with support and guidance from the experts in the field.
RESEARCH REPORT
Unpacking the Enablers and Hindrances on the PARRTH to SMART Work Design
This report unpacks the enablers and barriers to change across partner organisations in the Healthcare and Social Assistance (H&SA) industry. It identifies factors at multiple levels: organisational, leadership, group, and individual, and provides examples of activities and actions for organisations that can help address challenges at each level.
SMART animations
We partner with organisations and individuals in the NSW H&SA industry
Our research partners
The PARRTH process​​
The PARRTH process involves:
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Preparing an organisation for change;
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Assessing work design and well-being;
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Reflecting with the organisation staff and management about the assessment results;
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Redesigning work and/or organisational processes where appropriate and feasible;
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Tracking the effect of the redesign; and
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Habituating the change into the daily functioning of the organisation.
Helping care workers
Design for Care research project will produce work design strategies to aim to prevent psychological injury amongst care workers
including but not limited to:
Project team
Project leads
Professor Sharon K. Parker
CURTIN UNIVERSITY
Professor Anya Johnson
UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY
Professor Helena Nguyen
UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY
Professor Alex Collie
MONASH UNIVERSITY
Project members
Lucinda Iles
CURTIN UNIVERSITY
Cheryl Yam
CURTIN UNIVERSITY
Michael Chapman
CURTIN UNIVERSITY
Jie Yi Tang
CURTIN UNIVERSITY
Mina Askovic
UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY
Connie Deng
UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY
Jannecke Berecki-Gisolf
MONASH UNIVERSITY
Meredith Carr
CURTIN UNIVERSITY
Monica Trezise
CURTIN UNIVERSITY
Anu Jolly
UNIVERSITY OF WESTERN AUSTRALIA
Arian Kunzelmann
EDITH COWAN UNIVERSITY
Nate Zettna
UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY
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Vivien Forner
UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY
Shannon Gray
MONASH UNIVERSITY
Asmare Gelaw
MONASH UNIVERSITY
Giverny de Boeck
IESEG School of Management
