Dr. Kennette Thigpen Harris is our Chief Clinical Officer at TELUS Health. She ensures clinical excellence across services while translating wellbeing insights into actionable strategies for clients and teams.
Her passion for employee health is rooted in personal experience—early career burnout sparked a lifelong mission to create workplaces where people thrive, not just survive.
Kennette champions holistic, life-integrated support and advocates for women's health equity, working to build cultures where wellbeing is embedded into the everyday experience of work. In honour of International Women’s day (IWD), get to know Kennette better, and hear some of her thoughts on women’s specific health initiatives in the workplace.
Interview with Kennette:
Q: Can you tell us more about your background?
A: I’m a licensed clinical social worker and an international psychologist with over 20 years of experience spanning clinical practice, leadership and consulting. My career began in child welfare, juvenile justice and behavioral health, where I worked directly with individuals and families navigating complex challenges. From there, I expanded into strategic planning and organisational consulting, combining my clinical expertise with a systems-level perspective.
Across all these roles, my focus has always been on bridging clinical insight with real-world impact, creating solutions that support people, teams, and organisations to grow, succeed and sustain wellbeing.
Q: What drew you to the field of employee health and wellbeing? Was there a pivotal moment that made you realise this was your calling?
A: What drew me to the field of employee health and wellbeing is the intersection of personal experience and professional expertise. Early in my career, I experienced firsthand the toll of workplace stress; so severe that it landed me in the hospital. That moment was a wake-up call, not just for me, but for how I saw the ripple effects stress has on teams, families and entire organisations.
From that point, I knew my calling was to create workplaces where people are supported before crisis hits, combining my clinical training with real-world insight. Every day, I get to translate that vision into action developing policies, guiding teams and shaping programs that prevent burnout, foster resilience and create healthier work cultures.
What continues to inspire me is knowing that behind every data point or outcome is a real person with a life, a family and potential that can be nurtured or diminished by the workplace. My mission is simple but powerful: to transform workplaces into environments where people don’t just survive, they thrive, grow and bring their full selves to work. That’s the work that fuels my passion every single day, and it’s the reason I wake up excited for what’s next.
Q: Can you tell us more about your role with TELUS Health? What does your day to day look like?
A: As Chief Clinical Officer, my role is a dynamic mix of clinical oversight, thought leadership and strategic support for our clients, sales teams, and account managers. I spend my days ensuring our services meet the highest standards of quality and clinical excellence by developing policies, monitoring outcomes and guiding our counsellors to deliver evidence-based care that truly makes a difference.
At the same time, I translate these clinical insights into actionable strategies for sales and account management, helping organisations implement programs that are impactful, measurable, and aligned with best practices. No two days are ever the same. I might be reviewing performance metrics, coaching a leader on psychologically safe practices, shaping policies, speaking at a conference or collaborating with teams to create innovative wellbeing solutions.
The most rewarding part of the role is the intersection of people, policy and purpose: knowing that our work not only supports individual wellbeing, but also drives healthier, stronger workplaces where employees and organisations can succeed together.
Q: March 8th is International Women’s Day. In your expertise, what's the biggest gap in how organisations support women's holistic wellbeing, and what would a truly inclusive approach look like?
A: The biggest gap in how organisations support women’s holistic wellbeing is that they often treat it as a series of checkboxes without addressing the full complexity of women’s lives. True wellbeing isn’t just about mental health or time off; it’s about how work interacts with every stage of life—career growth, family responsibilities, physical health, caregiving and identity.
A truly inclusive approach recognises that women don’t compartmentalize their lives, and neither should organisations. It means designing policies, cultures and leadership practices that are flexible, equitable and responsive. It also means normalizing conversations about the challenges women face, removing stigma and embedding support into the everyday experience of work, not just in moments of crisis.
When organisations commit to holistic, life-integrated support, they don’t just help women survive, they empower them to grow, lead and innovate, which benefits everyone in the workplace.
Q: In the spirit of IWD, If you could dedicate this International Women's Day to addressing one specific health or wellbeing challenge that disproportionately affects women in the workplace, what would it be and why?
A: This International Women’s Day, I would dedicate the conversation to the women’s health continuum because so much of what women experience at work is shaped by health realities we still don’t openly acknowledge. From fertility challenges and pregnancy loss to postpartum changes, caregiving strain, perimenopause and menopause—these are not side issues. They are core wellbeing issues that affect focus, energy, confidence and longevity at work.
What’s striking is how often women manage these transitions in silence. They show up, perform and lead while navigating physical and emotional changes that were never designed into the workplace conversation. I’ve seen how the lack of language, flexibility and support around women’s health can quietly turn manageable life stages into chronic stress and disengagement.
If we want workplaces where women can truly thrive, we have to normalize the full spectrum of women’s health, not as accommodations, but as part of how healthy work is designed. When we support women across every stage of life, we don’t just improve wellbeing, we create stronger, more resilient organisations for everyone.
Q: What's one barrier you've faced as a woman in your field that you're determined the next generation won't have to experience?
A: As an African American woman, I learned early how to walk into rooms prepared to work harder while staying composed, capable and calm under pressure. That experience shaped my leadership, but it also reflects something many women understand: the invisible weight of carrying more than what’s expected, and often more than what’s seen.
One of the biggest barriers I’ve faced in this field is the unspoken expectation to be everything at once, credible but agreeable, confident but not too bold, accomplished but never intimidating. Early on, I realized that being capable wasn’t always enough; I also had to navigate how my voice would be received.
What I’m determined the next generation won’t have to experience is shrinking themselves to fit someone else’s comfort. Excellence shouldn’t come with extra explanation, and leadership shouldn’t require permission. As we approach International Women’s Day, my hope is that we continue building workplaces where women—regardless of background—are trusted for what they know, valued for how they lead, and supported without conditions. When women no longer have to choose between authenticity and advancement, everyone benefits.
Q: What separates organisations that truly prioritize employee wellbeing from those that just talk about it?
A: What separates organisations that truly prioritize employee wellbeing is follow-through. These are the organisations that move beyond statements and programs and embed wellbeing into daily decisions.
You can see the difference in the details: managers are trained and supported, not left to guess; wellbeing data is reviewed with the same seriousness as financial results; and support is designed to be easy to access, culturally relevant and stigma-free. Most importantly, employees don’t have to be in crisis to be seen or supported.
When wellbeing is real, it’s consistent, measurable and felt and that’s what turns good intentions into lasting impact.
Q: How has the conversation around mental health in the workplace shifted in recent years, and where do we still have work to do?
A: The conversation around mental health in the workplace has shifted from silence to visibility. What was once whispered is now discussed, and mental health is finally being recognised as a core part of performance, engagement and leadership—not a personal issue employees manage on their own.
Where we still have work to do is moving from awareness to action. Talking about mental health is not the same as designing work that supports it. Too often, we ask individuals to be more resilient without changing the systems that exhaust them. The next evolution is prevention, building psychologically safe cultures, training leaders with real skills and addressing psychosocial risks before people reach burnout or crisis.
Mental health at work isn’t a trend, it’s a responsibility. And the organisations that get this right won’t just retain talent; they’ll create healthier, more sustainable ways of working for everyone.