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SIPPA (Students of IPPA)

Leadership Team

Leadership Team

The IPPA Work and Organizations Division – a forum for scholars, practitioners and organizations to collaborate on positive psychology research and application in the organizational realm – recently elected its inaugural Division President, President-Elect and Secretary. Please join us in welcoming the IPPA Work and Organizations Division Officers:

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Scott Donaldson
President

Scott I. Donaldson is a Senior Researcher in the Department of Population and Public Health Sciences at the Keck School of Medicine of USC. More

Scott completed his Postdoctoral Scholarship in Evaluation, Statistics, and Measurement at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, and received his PhD in Psychology with a concentration in Evaluation and Applied Research Methods, and co-concentration in Positive Organizational Psychology from Claremont Graduate University. He received an MS in Applied Psychology from the University of Southern California, and a BA in Psychology from the University of California, Los Angeles.

His research uses quantitative methodologies, such as psychometric evaluation, meta-analysis, multitrait-multimethod analyses, and quantitative text analytics among other advanced statistical approaches to research the intersection of health, data science, and well-being. He currently works in the USC Social Media Analytics Lab on a multi-year monitoring and evaluation grant funded by the California Department of Public Health in addition to other grants funded by the Regents of California.

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Vicki Cabrera
President-Elect

Vicki Cabrera is a well-being and social impact consultant, researcher, and evaluator. More

Her evidence-based work focuses on achieving and measuring well-being and social impact for organizations, programs, and initiatives in the U.S., the Philippines, and internationally.

She also draws on 20 years of diverse experience (program & product management, nonprofit management, teaching/training, consulting) with a variety of organizations across the education, nonprofit/NGO, social enterprise, business, and public sectors in the U.S and Asia. Prior to consulting, she co-founded a school for social entrepreneurship in the Philippines and managed programs for the College Board and Dress for Success in the U.S.

Vicki is a PhD Candidate in Positive Organizational Psychology with a co-concentration in Evaluation & Applied Research Methods at Claremont Graduate University and holds an MPA in Public & Nonprofit Management & Policy from New York University. She also serves as an advisor to several social enterprises. In 2021, she received the IPPA Work and Organizations Division Exemplary Research to Practice Award in recognition of advancing the application of evidence-based science in the field of positive work and organizations.

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Ruben Chaumont
Community Director

Ruben Chaumont is passionate about helping organizations build empowering workplace cultures that unleash their employees’ full potentials for synergy, flourishing, creativity, and performance. More

For the last ten years, he has been helping organizations across various industries mostly in France and in the Philippines apply the latest research discoveries from the field of Positive Organizational Psychology to build governance, management, organizational and HR practices that bring out the best in their people.

He is the Founder & CEO of Intentional Work Communities, a management consulting firm based in the Philippines. He is also an Adjunct Faculty at the Asian Institute of Management under the Leadership & People Management department.

During 2012 and 2015 he has conducted a three-year PhD research in Management focused on the field of Positive Organizational Psychology under the supervision of Professor Sir Cary Cooper who was elected in 2014 the most influential thinker in HR in the UK and who is the Founding President of the British Academy of Management and the current President of CIPD.

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Dr. Lucy Rattrie
Strategic Communications Director

Dr Lucy Rattrie is a BPS Chartered Psychologist who believes in the power of developing psychological strengths for enabling people and teams to thrive with health, wellness and performance in all areas of life and work, achieving this with applied research, business advising, workshops, training and coaching. More

Lucy creates lasting change in behaviours, thoughts, emotions, quality of life, careers and organisations by focusing on positive experiences, traits and environments, blending her work with natural and lifestyle methods.

With fifteen years of experience in academic institutions and organisations ranging from high-end designer fashion, to industry leaders in global mobility, law and the biggest global accommodation brand, plus mind-set coaching for athletic professional and semi-pro athletes, and an international scholarship-funded PhD on engagement, burnout and performance of travelling professionals, Lucy understands how to develop people and teams in a way that generates positive returns for the organisation.

Add to that the fact she is a co-founder of the Business Travel Wellbeing Community, an author, international speaker, guest TV presenter, has been a road-warrior business traveller, an expatriate in four countries, and visited over 50, it becomes clear Lucy is uniquely positioned to achieve her mission: to inspire, enable and empower wellbeing and performance in one million international professionals through the joy of positive psychology.

Luis A. Marrero
Digests and Dialogues

A long-time member of IPPA, Luis is a founding member of the Work & Organization Division. He founded The Boston Institute for Meaningful Purpose and is the pioneer of Meaningful Purpose Psychology and Organization Development 2.0. More

A prolific writer and author of two books, Luis penned the award-winning The Path to a Meaningful Purpose: Psychological Foundations of Logoteleology (2013) and, with co-author Daniel Persuitte, Meaningful Purpose: A Primer in Logoteleology (2022). Luis services global Fortune 500 companies on three continents as a coach, consultant, facilitator, and leadership assessment and development expert. Through his Institute, Luis trains and certifies practitioners in the Meaningful Purpose Psychology (Logoteleology) method. He has held senior Human Resource and OD consulting positions in firms such as YSC Business Psychologists and The Walt Disney Company. Luis earned his BA in History at Siena Heights University (Adrian, Michigan) and a Master’s degree in Human Resource Management at the University of Puerto Rico. He did his thesis work in Transactional Analysis Psychology, which started a deep passion for anything psychological.

Luis is bi-lingual (Spanish and English) and is versed in leading in different cultural settings. He resides in Westfield, Massachusetts, and Deltona, Florida, with his wife, Nahir.

Dr. Sok-Ho Trinh
Community Outreach

Dr. Sok-Ho Trinh, is a Passionologist: a social and behavioral scientist who helps people live a successful life and career and make organizational teams work better. More

Inspired by humanistic values inherited from his parents and siblings who survived the Cambodian genocide, he initiated the Passionology movement to unleash people’s purpose and passion.

As a scientist, his interdisciplinary research interests include motivational constructs such as Passion in leadership, Positive Psychology Coaching and Happiness in the Performing Arts.

Being an active scholar, he completed his PhD at University of East London exploring Passion in Leadership, and he investigates Wellbeing through the performing arts at University of Roehampton. He investigated the Institute of Passion’s 4P model©, and the Passionate Leadership In Organisation (PLIO) concept. He contributed to chapters in the book Positive Psychology in practice and has authored and co-authored articles in Positive Psychology, Positive Leadership, and Positive Psychology Coaching.

As a practitioner, Sok-ho designed, trained and delivered research-based organisational interventions and has been coaching individuals, leaders, and organisational teams around the world.

As an academic, Sok-ho was a faculty member at University of East London in the MSc in Positive Psychology and Coaching Psychology (MAPPCP). He lectured at the Autonomous University of the State of Hidalgo (UAEH) in Mexico and at IE University/IE Business in Spain. He is presently a senior lecturer (Associate prof. in US and Maître de conference in France) at University of Roehampton where he leads and teaches courses related to leadership, psychology and human resources management, and org. behaviour. Sok-ho is also a founding faculty member at the Institute of Positive Psychology Coaching.

As a business leader, he has served global organizations in retail and consumer analytics and data science for nearly 15 years and acted as advisory board member and a mentor to social enterprises.

As a professional artist, Sok-ho worked in musical theatre, screen acting, voice acting, and wrote and recorded a mini album. He trained at The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, the Actors Centre, in dance and musical theatre in the UK and in France. He is represented by Nic Knight Management.

Sok-ho was born in France raised by Chinese parents who were born in Cambodia, he can speak 8 languages, has lived in 3 continents, and he is now based in London, UK with his family. His motto in life is Live with Purpose and Passion

Dr. Rona Hart
Leadership Committee Member

Rona is a lecturer in higher education, course leader, researcher, practitioner, and author in Applied Positive Psychology. More

She began her academic career as a Social Psychology researcher in Education, and completed her PhD at King’s College London. She also has BA and MA in Education, an MSc in Applied Positive Psychology and a Post-Graduate Diploma in Group Counselling. Her PhD explored the experience of immigrant families as they engaged with London schools, and she was particularly interested in the coping mechanisms that immigrant families employ to overcome the hurdles of international migration and the challenges of adapting to a new culture, and raising children in a cross cultural environment.

She began to engage with Positive Psychology research and apply its interventions during her PhD, when she developed and delivered a cross-cultural psycho-educational programme for overseas students. The programme drew from her dissertation, and was designed to ease participants’ cross-cultural adaptation process, lessen transition shock and culture shock symptoms, increase wellbeing and resilience, and promote their socio-cultural integration. In her subsequent jobs she developed and delivered several training programmes, which incorporate Positive Psychology interventions, which are tailored for occupational settings, including Stress Management, Resilience Building, Occupational Wellbeing, Prosocial Behaviour, Strength Work, and Mindfulness.

Over the years she developed expertise in Positive Work and Organisational Psychology. Her current work is interdisciplinary and ties together topics from Positive Work and Organisational Psychology and Economic and Consumer Psychology, Prosocial Behaviour and Mindfulness. She’s also been teaching these topics mainly in higher education. She’s currently the Course Leader for the PGCert online distance learning course: The Psychology of Kindness and Wellbeing at Work at the University of Sussex, UK. She’s also the former course leader for the MSc in Applied Positive Psychology and the MSc in Applied Positive Psychology and Coaching Psychology at the University of East London, UK.

She published 3 books and numerous papers. Her last book Positive Psychology: the Basics (Routledge) is a textbook used for teaching in higher education. She’s currently writing another book. Recently she’s taken the role of Guest Editor for Behavioural Sciences for a special issue on: Prosocial Behaviours at Work: Key Concepts, Measures, Interventions, Antecedents, and Outcomes.

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Donald Officer
Leadership Committee Member

Donald R. Officer, The Intention Coach, is a practising writer, editor, researcher, coach, facilitator, consultant, trainer and lecturer with over 30 years experience in the workplace, field and classroom. More

A regular contributor to several blogs, websites and e-zines, he is a also a certified facilitator developing and delivering workshops to business, education, and public sector organizations. He has taught applied psychology to university undergraduates and maintains theintentioncoach.com blog. His goal is to help others better understand our changing workplace and culture while contributing to positive and applied psychology, through publication of science based books and articles.

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Elizabeth (Liz) Corcoran
Immediate Past-President

Liz has been a member of IPPA for 14 years and attended seven World Congresses. More

She presented at the 2021 Evidence in Action Conference and Idea Starter Symposium. Liz received the prestigious James O. Pawelski Positive Catalyst Award at the 2021 IPPA World Congress for her contributions to IPPA and the WOD Division.

Liz, SVP Design of Impact Performance, has 23 years of experience leading an organization that specializes in research, program design, development, and facilitation of custom leadership, sales, and service solutions infused with positive psychology that enable organizations to deepen client relationships and ignite employee engagement. Liz has worked extensively with Fortune 500 companies to enhance sales productivity, enhance employee well-being, increase service effectiveness, and enable leadership and coaching skills in financial markets, manufacturing, healthcare, and retail industries.

Liz is a Certified Practitioner in Appreciative Inquiry, Strengthscope Practitioner/Coach, Daniel Goleman Emotional Intelligence Coach. Liz is Past President of International Positive Psychology Association’s Work & Org Division. She holds a Bachelor’s of Science in Marketing from Boston College, Masters of Business Administration from New York University, and Masters in Applied Positive Psychology from University of Pennsylvania. She resides in Wellesley, Massachusetts with her husband, Joe, and her three children.

Liz is also an active member of Association of Training and Development (atd).  She holds a Bachelor’s of Science in Marketing from Boston College and a Masters of Business Administration from New York University in Finance and Accounting.  She resides in Wellesley, Massachusetts with her husband, Joe, and her three children.  Her son Connor is an IPPA member.

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Giselle Timmerman
Leadership Committee Member (and W&O Division Past-President)

Giselle was part of the Work & Org Division’s initial steering committee in 2012 and was elected President-elect in 2013. More

She has enjoyed helping to get IPPA’s first professional Division off the ground and is committed to maximizing the Division’s value for its members.

After studying under Martin Seligman in his first Masters class (’05), Giselle has navigated a unique career path, starting as a management and strategy consultant applying positive psychology to strategy, leadership, and organizations. In 2012, she started her own company, Positive Work, where she designs and manages projects that help organizations build positive leaders, engaged and resilient teams, and exceptional work cultures. Giselle has worked with social, public, and private sector organizations, and with a range of global leaders, from community champions to Fortune 100 executives.

Giselle holds a Master’s degree in Applied Positive Psychology (MAPP) with a concentration in Organizational Leadership from the University of Pennsylvania and a BA in Psychology, Sociology, and Public Policy from New York University. She is an American currently living in Barcelona, Spain with her French husband and young daughter.

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Gregory Hennessy
Leadership Committee Member (and W&O Division Past-President)

Gregory Hennessy has been a strategy and organizational development consultant for over 20 years. More

As a former McKinsey Engagement Manager and Professional Development Manager, he has a history of getting things done. He is transitioning out of industry and into academia, and is currently a doctoral student in Positive Organizational Psychology at Claremont Graduate University. He currently holds Master’s degrees in Social Science (Caltech) and System Dynamics (MIT Sloan School of Management).