My Journey

My journey began with a simple ambition: to help people.

Growing up, my father — a successful leader himself — often told me:

"To truly help people, you must know them, live among them, and understand them."

I didn't fully appreciate the significance of those words at the time. Over the years, however, they became increasingly relevant to how I think about leadership, organisations and change.

I began my professional life as a scientist, completing a BSc, MSc and PhD in Molecular Virology, with research including coronavirus vaccine development.

Science taught me to be curious, challenge assumptions, look beneath symptoms and understand how interconnected systems behave.

Those principles have stayed with me throughout my career.

From Science to International Business

In 2009, I moved from scientific research into the commercial world, beginning the next chapter of my career across the diagnostics, MedTech and life sciences industries.

Over more than a decade, I worked internationally across sales, business development, marketing and commercial leadership, operating across EMEA within complex, technical and highly regulated environments.

I worked alongside scientists, clinicians, commercial teams, senior leaders, customers and cross-functional stakeholders — often where scientific innovation, commercial priorities and human dynamics needed to come together.

It taught me something important:

Technical expertise alone rarely creates sustainable change.

Strategy matters. Processes matter. Technology matters.

But how people lead, communicate, make decisions, respond to uncertainty, build trust, and work together often determines whether strategy succeeds in practice.

That realisation gradually changed the direction of my career.

Understanding the Human Side of Performance

My interest in coaching and human behaviour began much earlier, following the unexpected loss of my father to cancer in 2012.

That experience led to years of learning, reflection and personal development — and eventually to formal study in coaching, neuroscience, positive psychology and behavioural change.

What began as a personal journey developed into a professional one.

Today, my approach brings together:

Scientific thinking
to diagnose, question and understand complex systems.

Commercial experience
to remain grounded in organisational realities, strategy and performance.

Leadership and organisational development
to strengthen capability, culture and ways of working.

Neuroscience and behavioural science
to better understand how people respond to uncertainty, pressure, learning and change.

Coaching
to create the space for leaders and individuals to think differently, take ownership and translate insight into action.

Why Engineered Life by Design?

I founded Engineered Life by Design to bring these worlds together.

Today, our work sits at the intersection of:

Leadership | Organisational Change | Talent | Culture | Human Behaviour | Future Workforce

We work with organisations navigating questions such as:

How do we lead effectively through uncertainty and change?

How do we protect trust, capability and critical talent during M&A, restructuring or redundancy?

How do we develop leaders for the organisation we're becoming — not simply the organisation we have today?

How do we attract, integrate, develop and retain the people we need?

How will AI, changing skills and emerging generations reshape our workforce?

And increasingly:

Are organisations ready for the workforce that's coming?

We don't begin with an off-the-shelf programme.

We begin by understanding the organisation, the business challenge and the people within it.

Diagnose → Co-design → Deliver → Embed

The Workforce That Is Coming.

The Workplace They Are Entering.

Alongside my work with organisations and leaders, I have become increasingly involved in education, STEM, careers and employer engagement.

Through my work with schools, colleges and universities, I see one side of the workforce equation:

the workforce that is coming.

Through my corporate career and my work with leaders and organisations, I see the other:

the workplaces they are entering.

And increasingly, I see a gap between the two.

Young people are being prepared for a world of work being reshaped by AI, technology, changing skills and new career pathways.

At the same time, organisations are asking how they can attract scarce talent, manage multigenerational workforces, develop future skills and retain the people they need.

These conversations cannot happen independently.

That insight led to the development of Future Workforce Readiness™.

Future Workforce Readiness™

Future Workforce Readiness™ is an evolving ecosystem connecting education, emerging talent and employers.

It looks across the journey:

EDUCATION → EMERGING TALENT → WORKPLACE → LEADERSHIP → FUTURE WORKFORCE

The principle is simple:

We need to prepare people for the changing workplace — and prepare workplaces for their changing people.

Through work with schools and future talent, we help create greater understanding of careers, industries, future skills and the realities of work.

Through colleges and universities, we can help emerging talent build the behaviours, adaptability, professional confidence and workplace understanding needed to make the transition from education to employment.

And through organisations, we look at whether leadership, culture, onboarding, development and talent systems are ready to attract, integrate, develop and retain the workforce they need for the future.

Because attracting talent is only the beginning.

What happens after great talent says yes?

Where Strategy Meets People

My perspective is shaped by four interconnected lenses:

SCIENCE

Evidence | Curiosity | Diagnosis | Systems Thinking

Understanding what's really happening before deciding what needs to change.

BUSINESS

Strategy | Commercial Reality | Customers | Growth | Performance

Ensuring people and leadership interventions remain connected to organisational priorities.

PEOPLE

Leadership | Behaviour | Culture | Coaching | Capability

Understanding the human dynamics that enable — or prevent — sustainable performance.

FUTURE

AI | Changing Skills | Emerging Talent | Education | Evolving Work

Looking beyond today's challenges to the capability organisations will need next.

Beyond the Boardroom

My work also extends into the wider talent and skills ecosystem.

I serve as a Trustee of Women Leaders UK and lead the MK Innovates STEM Festival, bringing together employers, education and young people to increase exposure to STEM careers and future opportunities.

I am also an Enterprise Adviser, supporting stronger connections between education and the world of work, and a registered coach with the NHS Leadership Academy, supporting leadership development within healthcare.

These experiences give me something I consider increasingly valuable:

visibility across different stages of the workforce journey.

From a young person beginning to understand what a career might look like, to an emerging professional entering the workplace, to a manager learning to lead, to an executive navigating significant organisational change.

Different stages.

Different challenges.

But part of the same system.

Experience & Professional Development

My professional background includes:

PhD in Molecular Virology

20+ years across scientific research, international business, leadership and organisational development

Former commercial leader across global diagnostics, MedTech and life sciences organisations

Certified Brain-Based Coach — NeuroLeadership Institute

NHS Leadership Academy Registered Coach

Positive Psychology and behavioural science-informed practice

DISC behavioural profiling

Chartered Marketer — CIM

Executive, leadership and team coaching

Organisational and workforce transformation

STEM, education and employer engagement

A More Human Approach to Organisational Performance

The ambition that started my career hasn't disappeared.

It has evolved.

Today, helping people means looking beyond the individual.

It means understanding the leader, the team, the organisation and the wider system around them.

It means helping organisations make difficult decisions without forgetting the people affected by them.

It means developing leaders who can create environments in which people can contribute, grow and perform.

And it means thinking further ahead — about the skills, talent and workplaces we need to build for the future.

Because organisations don't transform on strategy alone.

People make transformation possible.

Dr Susan Izadkhasti
Founder & CEO, Engineered Life by Design

Leadership & Organisational Adviser | Future Workforce Strategist