Dr. W. G. "Will" Zhao is Assistant Professor of Organization and Human Behavior at the Stratford School of Interaction Design and Business, University of Waterloo. A French-Canadian dual national, he draws on his diverse cultural and academic background to enrich his interdisciplinary research on innovation, exploring its myriad facets and manifestations. He earned his PhD from the French Grande Ecole EMLYON Business School and pursued postdoctoral research at Stanford University as a SCANCOR scholar. Before joining UW Stratford, he received his first promotion to tenured Associate Professor at an AACSB-accredited Canadian business school, where he had won several teaching and research awards at both faculty and university levels.
Dr. Zhao’s overall career goal is to advance Human-Centered Innovation Research (HCIR), which prioritizes innovation that is fundamentally aligned with human well-being and societal betterment through an integrative approach that bridges multiple disciplines. His research has appeared in impactful social science, engineering, and interdisciplinary journals, such as Research in the Sociology of Organizations and IEEE Transactions on Cybernetics, and premier conferences such as Academy of Management meetings. With UW Approved Doctoral Dissertation Supervisor status, Dr. Zhao welcomes inquiries from prospective graduate students and postdoctoral researchers who share an interest in researching Innovation, especially where it intersects with Organization, Health, Education, Ethics, Semiotics, Arts-based Methods, and Applied AI and other Emerging Technologies.
