Interview with Chris Rider
- Merle van den Akker
- 12 minutes ago
- 8 min read
Behavioural Science is a rapidly expanding field and everyday new research is being developed in academia, tested and implemented by practitioners in financial organisations, development agencies, government ‘nudge’ units and more. This interview is part of a series interviewing prominent people in the field. And in today's interview the answers are provided by Chris Rider.
Chris is the Associate Director of Culture & Human-Centered Experience at Novartis. Chris is a recognized expert in the application of behavioral science for organizational dynamics, with a particular focus on fostering ethical workplaces. His work has featured in publications such as MIT Sloan Management Review, where he has contributed significant insights on ethical behavior and psychological safety. Additionally, his expertise in leveraging behavioral science for ethics risk and compliance, and for enhancing employee training, has been featured by Gartner. Chris's commitment to impactful projects was further acknowledged when he received the Project of the Year award at the ECEC 2022 conference.
Who or what got you into behavioural science?
It was not a conventional start. It's definitely a second career for me. I initially began as a trained accountant and internal auditor. I worked at KPMG for five years, doing risk consulting and audits, and I had a performance review one year where I was asked the question, "What do you like about what you do?"
And I think at the time I made something up on the spot, but the question stayed with me. It really made me reflect: what am I genuinely interested in? I’d always had an interest in psychology, but never more than just reading the odd airport book on holiday. Then I came across the world of behavioural science, and I messaged a bunch of folks on LinkedIn, asking, "Do people actually do this for a living?" One of the people I connected with was Jez Groom at Cowry Consulting. He very kindly offered me a week's work experience. So I took a week’s holiday and spent it at Cowry to get a taste for behavioural science work. I loved it. I didn’t return from holiday with a tan, but it had convinced me to take a career break, do a master’s, and take the leap to try break into behavioural science. That led me to my first behavioural science role at Novartis, where I’ve now been for almost five years.
What is the accomplishment you are proudest of as a behavioural scientist? And what would you still like to achieve?
The global ethics survey that we set up at Novartis. I think that’s what I’m most proud of. It’s an enormous survey all about ethical culture, which we designed in-house and have run across the whole organization for the last few years. It’s an in depth, lengthy survey-around 50 questions- and is fully anonymous and confidential. We get around 30,000 or so responses each time which really underscores the interest people at Novartis have in engaging on ethics. That’s exactly why I’m so proud of this.
It’s not just about getting data - it’s also about what we do with that data. The survey has opened up so many conversations, from broad questions like "What is ethics?" to concrete discussions on how to build psychological safety, fairness, or manage goal pressure. We ask behavioral questions like whether people have seen potentially unethical behaviour, whether they raised concerns, how did people respond when you raised concerns etc. This generates really actionable insights for leaders and has given us the power to drive change at an organizational level.
It has been a catalyst for so much of the work done since - sparking experiments, academic collaborations, and even some publications with a couple articles in MIT Sloan which are definitely career highlights I’m grateful to have been involved with.
Looking ahead, I’d love to integrate what I’ve learned into broader cultural change initiatives at Novartis. I’m moving soon into a new role in HR, focusing on culture and employee experience, and I’m really excited to take a behavioural science approach to these new areas.
Outside of Novartis, I’d love to start a behavioural science volunteering service - something that connects behavioural scientists with small charities that can benefit from behavioural insights but don’t have the resources to hire full-time experts. I’ve even got a name for it: "Spare Change."
How do you think behavioural science will develop in the next 10 years?
I think there will be more in-house behavioural science roles. Over the past decade, behavioural science consultancies have dominated the space, and they’ve done a great job of creating demand-introducing behavioural science to companies, running pilots, proving its value. But I think the next natural step is for more companies to bring those capabilities in-house.
We’ve already seen this trend in large organizations. More businesses want to move beyond hiring consultants for short-term projects and instead embed behavioural science into their core operations - whether in HR, marketing, compliance, or product design. I see behavioural scientists increasingly becoming an integral part of teams, rather than being a dedicated team that gets pulled in when needed.
Another shift will be the merging of behavioural science with other disciplines. We’re already seeing overlaps with HR, UX, marketing, and AI, and I expect those connections to deepen. For example, in my new role, “Human-Centered Culture Design Lead”, I’ll be combining behavioral science with design thinking to drive better employee experience and culture change.
What are the greatest challenges being faced by behavioural science right now?
A big challenge I see is how we communicate about behavioural science. I’ve seen incredible behavioural science work get presented to business leaders, only for it to completely miss the mark - too much jargon, too technical, too focused on the academic side rather than the practical business impact.
If we want behavioural science to be truly impactful, we need to be better at reading our audience. Do we need to explain regressions or p-values to executives? Probably not. They assume we’ve done the research properly. What they care about is how it applies to their business-can we implement this intervention? What will the return on investment be?
This also ties into a broader issue of the “academia to application” time lag. I remember reading a quote once it on average takes a decade for insights to filter into real-world applications. Whether that’s exactly right I’m not so sure, but the general point I feel is a valid one. And part of that time lag comes down to how research is typically written. Academic papers tend to be complex and dense, full of technical terminology which is great for other academics and definitely has its place. But it does makes it difficult for practitioners to extract useful insights. If we want behavioural science to be applied more widely, we need to find ways to make latest, cutting edge research more accessible.
With all your experience, what skills would you say are needed to be a behavioural scientist? Are there any recommendations you would make?
A skill set I’d highlight starts with building trust. We’re often asking people to do something they’ve never done before-step outside their comfort zone, try a new way of working, or change long-standing practices. So they need to trust that we know what we’re doing and that we’ll guide them through the process safely.
The second key skill is the ability to communicate complex ideas simply. A lot of our work involves influencing non-behavioural scientists-business leaders, policymakers, HR professionals. If we start throwing around jargon and listing frameworks, we lose them. It’s not about trying to sound smart-it’s about being clear and making behavioural insights practical and actionable.
The third is somewhere between a skill and a mindset: being bold. There’s so much potential for applied behavioural science in organizations, but we often face pushback. Not necessarily because people are opposed to it, but because they don’t fully understand it yet. As behavioural scientists, we need to own our ideas and advocate for them. If we dilute our approach too much to fit within existing structures, we lose the impact.
I think a lot about whether the work we’re doing is genuinely pushing boundaries. Are we testing new approaches? Are we creating something meaningful? It’s easy to fall into the trap of doing things that are safe and repetitive, but the real value comes from being bold and experimental.
So, if I had to sum it up: build trust, communicate well, and don’t be afraid to push for your ideas.
What advice would you give to young behavioural scientists or those looking to progress into the field?
If you’re trying to break into behavioural science, talk to people. That was how I started. I messaged people on LinkedIn and said, “Your job looks really interesting-can I ask you about it?” Most people are happy to help. In behavioural science, people tend to be passionate about their work, and they’re usually willing to share their experiences.
The second thing I’d say is to find a niche. A lot of people come out of behavioural science master’s programs with a similar general skill set. While the essentials is of course necessary, but what makes you stand out? Try to develop a behavioural science+ approach. Maybe you combine behavioural science with HR, customer experience, public policy, sustainability, or ethics. Having that added specialization gives you a clearer personal value proposition when applying for jobs.
The job market is competitive, so my advice is: Talk to people, develop a specialization, and keep learning. And if you’re looking for work, remember that behavioural science is increasingly showing up in non-obvious places-corporate ethics, product design, fintech, sustainability. Stay open-minded about where you apply your skills.
If you weren’t a behavioural scientist, what would you be doing?
I think either way, I would have left internal audit. That was definitely not my passion. But where I would have ended up instead? I think there are two possibilities.
One is that I might have gone all the way into psychology-full-blown psychologist, rather than applied behavioural science in a business setting. Behavioural science was a natural step for me because it wasn’t too far removed from my consulting background. But without that, I think I might have gone deeper into clinical or research psychology.
The other path is completely different-I’ve always liked the idea of teaching. I never formally pursued it, beyond some tutoring as a side hustle during university. But I could have seen myself teaching maths, which was my best subject at school. It would have been a very different career path, but I think I would have found it fulfilling in a different way. And who knows, there’s always time!
How do you apply behavioural science in your personal life?
A couple of examples come to mind.
First, I started a book club with a friend from my master's program. Each month, we pick a book, read it, and then meet up to discuss it. It works well as a commitment device-it holds me accountable to actually read the books rather than letting them pile up on my shelf. The “club” is just the two of us, so calling it a "book club" is a bit of a stretch. But it works.
The second one is some classic temptation bundling. I love running, but only when I listen to podcasts. The lure of a good podcast really helps give me that little extra motivation to get my trainers on and out the door. Particularly the ‘Elis James and John Robins’ podcast which really cracks me up when slogging up hills near me.
Which other behavioural scientists would you love to read an interview by?
Yeah, I always find this a tricky one because you’ve interviewed so many people! But I’d say my colleague Baiba Renerte, who I’ve worked closely with for four years. Also, Katryn Wright at More Than Now-she’s just taken over as Managing Director, so great timing. Jordan Whitwell Mac has been doing fascinating applied behavioural science work in Abu Dhabi with the local government. And Daniel Seyffardt from Affective Advisory - he’s been very involved with GAABS. I think they’d all have really interesting insights to share!
Thank you so much for taking the time to answer my questions Chris!
As I said before, this interview is part of a larger series which can also be found here on the blog. Make sure you don't miss any of those, nor any of the upcoming interviews!
Keep your eye on Money on the Mind!
