Research
Why I research play.
Not because it's fun. Because the evidence kept telling me something important that organisations weren't listening to.
Playful Work Design
Most people assume play at work is a nice idea.
They're wrong.
The research on play — on how it shapes the brain, what it produces in teams and what happens to organisations when they systematically remove it — is substantial, rigorous and largely ignored by the people who need it most.
This is my attempt to change that.
Study 01
The Playful Work Equation.
In collaboration with a global toy foundation, I led research across seven international organisations — including IKEA, World Vision and Sesame Workshop — to understand what actually enables play at work.
The answer turned out to be three things: Permission, Space and a Spark.
Miss one and the whole system breaks down. A spark without space becomes a one-off event. Permission and space without a spark means people wait for someone else to go first. All three together and something remarkable happens: connection deepens, wellbeing improves and new thinking emerges — measurably, repeatedly, across cultures and industries.
That framework is called the Playful Work Equation. It's the foundation of how I design every experience I deliver.
The Playful Work Equation has been covered in SmartCompany, Australia's leading publication for business leaders and entrepreneurs.
Read the article →Study 02
RMIT University: Playful Work Design.
In partnership with RMIT University's Behavioural Business Lab, I've been investigating how play-based learning interventions affect performance in enterprise settings.
Phase 1 established the evidence base. Phase 2 tested it experimentally with 127 participants and produced statistically significant improvements in engagement, learning adaptability and belonging.
The finding that stays with me: the organisations that struggle most with change aren't the ones that lack strategy. They're the ones that have systematically removed the conditions that make humans good at learning. Play isn't the solution to that problem. It's the restoration of what was always there.
Study 03
Full Stack Human.
Full Stack Human (Wiley, 2026), co-authored with Tāne Hunter, is where the research and the lived experience meet. It's the most complete articulation of what a decade of work, study and genuine personal reckoning has produced.
It argues that the capabilities organisations need most right now — adaptability, curiosity, hope, play — aren't soft skills. They're the architecture of human performance. And most organisations are accidentally dismantling them.
I'm not a researcher who stumbled into practice. I'm a practitioner who kept asking why — until the evidence gave me answers worth sharing.
If you want to go deeper into any of this work, I'm always up for a conversation.