Our Team

Thomas Smahel

M.Arch., B.A.Sc., CCPE
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Thomas Smahel (CCPE, RSP2B), is President and Principal Consultant at Human Factors North Inc. and has over 25 years of experience applying human factors research to the design of safe transportation systems. He is past chair of the Transportation Association of Canada (TAC) Road Safety Committee and a past board member of the Canadian College for the Certification of Professional Ergonomists (CCCPE). He has carried out numerous evaluations of road design, including the design and placement of signs, and he has extensive experience evaluating the design of transit vehicles and on transit operation. Mr. Smahel has acted as a human factors expert witness in over 250 legal cases involving collisions between motor vehicles, trains, transit vehicles, pedestrians, and cyclists.

Kathy Kawaja

M.Sc., CCPE
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Kathy Kawaja, (CCPE) is Vice President and Principal Consultant at Human Factors North Inc. She has been a Canadian Certified Professional Ergonomist since 2001. She holds an M.Sc. (2022, McMaster University) in Kinesiology and a B.Sc. (1988, University of Waterloo) in Kinesiology. Ms. Kawaja has over 30 years’ of experience in the physical aspects of applied ergonomics. She routinely analyzes the physical requirements associated with work conditions and determines musculoskeletal injury risk based on human capabilities and limitations. She has conducted several hundred assessments in a variety of industries from manufacturing to greenhouses to emergency medical services. In addition to risk assessments, Ms. Kawaja provides expertise in design projects, ergonomics programming and strategy, and legal cases involving musculoskeletal injury.

Dr. Alison Smiley

PhD, CCPE
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Dr. Alison Smiley (CCPE) is a Principal Consultant and Past President of HFN Inc. (1984-2021). She holds a PhD (1978) in Systems Design Engineering, specializing in Human Factors and was the founding Chair of the Canadian College for the Certification of Professional Ergonomists (CCCPE, 2001). She has 40 years’ experience in the measurement of driver performance as affected by sign design, distraction, fatigue, drugs, and headlight design. She has taught courses on human factors to traffic engineers, highway designers, university students and accident re-constructionists across Canada and the U.S. She has written on human factors and road safety issues for various manuals and books, including the Ontario Traffic Manual, and the Geometric Design Guide for Canadian Roads. She has acted as an expert witness in over 500 legal cases involving motor vehicle crashes.

Dr. Don C. Donderi

PhD
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Dr. Don C. Donderi is a co-founder and Principal Consultant of Human Factors North, Inc. He retired from the Department of Psychology at McGill University, Montréal, after a research and teaching career of 47 years’ experience. His work includes applied research and development on flight simulation, marine navigation, rail transport, road transport, air traffic control, nuclear power, and marine search and rescue. He offers legal expert advice on the perceptual and cognitive causes of accidents.

Dr. Christina (Missy) Rudin-Brown

PhD, MA, CCPE
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Dr. Christina (Missy) Rudin-Brown (CCPE) has been a Human Factors Specialist for over 25 years, with extensive experience in human factors transportation safety research, investigations, and evaluation. She holds Ph.D. (1999) and Master’s (1993) degrees in Experimental Psychology from the University of Toronto and is a past board member of the Canadian College for the Certification of Professional Ergonomists (CCCPE). Between 2012 and 2024, she investigated the human factors’ aspects of transportation occurrences in the railway, aviation, and marine modes as Senior Human Factors Investigator and Manager with the Transportation Safety Board of Canada (TSB). Before that, she planned, managed, and carried out a significant program of research in human factors as Senior Research Fellow with the Monash University Accident Research Centre (MUARC) in Melbourne (Australia). Earlier in her career, Dr. Rudin-Brown spent over 10 years with the federal government conducting research to support the development of motor vehicle safety standards and regulations as a Human Factors Specialist in Transport Canada’s Road Safety Directorate. Since joining HFN in 2012, Dr. Rudin-Brown has investigated and acted as human factors expert witness in over 30 motor vehicle collision and product safety legal cases. In 2021, she extended her human factors expertise to the aerospace industry to support design of the human-machine interfaces of the Canadarm3 - the Canadian-made robotics system destined for the lunar environment. More recently, she has been supporting VIA Rail Canada in their efforts to improve operational safety through a focus on human factors and system safety.

Steven Smith

B.Sc., R.Kin., CCPE
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Steven Smith (CCPE), Principal Ergonomics Consultant, is a Canadian Certified Professional Ergonomist with over 22 years’ experience in the physical aspects of applied ergonomics. He holds a B.Sc. (2001) from Simon Fraser University in Kinesiology (Ergonomics/Human Factors concentration). He has carried out countless projects in a wide variety of workplace environments to prevent musculoskeletal disorders, provide training/education, and improve workplace productivity and performance. His projects have included a full range of ergonomic services such as ergonomic analysis, strategic planning, job/physical demands analysis, ergonomic design review, assistance with MOL orders, and designing/delivering training. Mr. Smith has extensive experience in office and industrial ergonomics, and job demands analysis, as well as managing return to work and ensuring employee job suitability and accommodation. Mr. Smith is a former board member and Treasurer with the Canadian College for the Certification of Professional Ergonomists (CCCPE). He also contributed as an Influential Ergonomist to the Institute for Work and Health, and is a Registered Kinesiologist (R.Kin.).

Andrea Cassano-Piché

M.A.Sc., P.Eng.
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Andrea Cassano-Piché, Human Factors Engineering Consultant, is a licensed Professional Engineer and holds a M.A.Sc (2006) in Industrial Engineering, specializing in Human Factors Engineering. Since 2003, Ms. Cassano-Piché has applied her human factors training to the health care context. Her work has focused on procurement and implementation of health technology, health technology design and evaluation, proactive risk management (e.g., failure mode and effects analysis), the development of patient safety systems and culture, and teaching human factors methods.

Ms. Cassano-Piché has led national projects on complex topics such as ambulatory intravenous chemotherapy safety and multiple intravenous infusion safety, which culminated in nationally and internationally recognized recommendations on clinical practice, technology design, and education. She is the lead author of the book Human Factors for Health Technology Safety (2015) available at www.ifmbe.org.

Her strong desire for continuous learning and her ability to quickly build a rapport with clients, allowed Ms. Cassano-Piché to extend her consulting expertise to the aerospace industry where she is currently supporting the design of human-machine interfaces for the ground control operations of the CanadArm 3 on NASA’s Deep Space Gateway – a lunar orbiting space station with a goal of extending human presence at a larger distance from Earth.