James R. Barker

James R. Barker is the Herbert S. Lamb Chair in Business Education at the Rowe School of Business, within the Faculty of Management at Dalhousie University, in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Barker’s research focuses on how internal behaviour affects an organization’s ability to improve and sustain safety, and safety-related knowledge; manage change; and innovate.

Barker writes for Management Communication Quarterly, where he was editor-in-chief from 2006 – 2012. Barker’s recognition includes the 2010 Fredric M. Jablin Award for outstanding contributions to organizational communication; a 2014 Canadian Journal of Administrative Sciences award for best paper of the year; and a 2017 National Communication Association award for best book editing.

Funded by the Nova Scotia Health Research Foundation, Barker’s current research – part of Safe Assured – focuses on providing health care professionals and managers with the knowledge they need to achieve new standards for safer, better health care processes and practices.

Barker taught at New Zealand’s University of Waikato Management School; Marquette University (a Catholic, Jesuit institution in Milwaukee, Wisconsin), the University of New Mexico, and the United States Air Force Academy, in Colorado Springs.

Barker has conducted research with flight crews, engineering and technology executives, scientists and policy makers, manufacturing managers, and medical safety specialists.

Barker earned his BA from the University of Central Arkansas; his MA from Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana; and his PhD from the University of Colorado, in Boulder, Colorado.[1]

Barker's work touches on knowledge of teamwork, organizational communication, ethics and strategy, managerial theory and practice, leadership, high-risk environments, change and symbolic management, stakeholder engagement, and complexity theory.