Cuddesdon Compassion Salon: How to be a Compassionate Academic

Dr Kathryn Waddington is a Chartered Coaching Psychologist, Principal Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and Emerita Fellow in Work and Organisational Psychology at the University of Westminster.

Kathryn began her career in nursing working in acute clinical settings before pursuing academic studies in work and organisational psychology. Her doctorate from the University of London explored the characteristics and role of gossip in healthcare organisations. 

Kathryn’s other areas of interest include organisational compassion, and the creation of compassionate cultures and practices. She has particularly explored the need for critical approaches to compassion in higher education as well as undertaking research with students as co-researchers into the development of compassionate learning and teaching practices and campus cultures.

Kathryn has published widely during her career, including Towards a Compassionate University. Her latest book, How to be a Compassionate Academic: Scholarship and Sustainable Development (published October 2026), presents a practical roadmap for academics and all who wish to learn, research, and educate as compassionate global citizens. Amid a rapidly evolving higher education landscape, she highlights how individuals in academia can adopt thoughtful and sustainable practices.

Dr Katherine Southwood is Professor of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament at the University of Oxford. 

Her research focuses on primary evidence, such as Hebrew Bible material and evidence out of the Hebrew Bible including manuscripts, inscriptions, artefacts, papyri, and ostraca, dated to the Neo-Babylonian and Persian periods. 

Katherine is also widely published including:

• The Civic Value of the Humanities: A Case for Compassion
• Job’s Body and the Dramatized Comedy of Moralising
• Marriage by Capture in the Book of Judges: An Anthropological Approach
• Ethnicity and the Mixed Marriage Crisis in Ezra 9–10: An Anthropological Approach