Greg Paoli
CEO, Principal Risk Scientist
MASc, BASc
Joined RSI in 2006
- Has provided risk assessment services worldwide for 30 years
- Past Chair of the Food and Water Risk Assessment Specialty Group of the SRA
- Served on multiple U.S. National Academy of Sciences Committees
- Expert in risks associated with chemical hazards
- Distinguished Lectureship Award by SRA and Sigma Xi
Personal introduction
Current Focus
As RSI's Principal Risk Scientist and CEO, Greg Paoli is currently working with a broad spectrum of clients in the public and private sectors, with the greatest emphasis on the development of new approaches to transform regulatory systems to be more “risk-based” at multiple levels: how senior decision-makers process risk information and make the “tough choices” in regulating
health and safety, how an organization can optimize its resources across a diverse mandate to maximize total “portfolio-level” risk reduction, and how to operationalize key resources like the scheduling of inspections when faced with thousands of inspection targets, but not enough resources to inspect all of them.
While food safety and chemical safety continue to be an important part of his work, he has also been fortunate to gain a deep understanding of a very wide variety of risks borne by the public or the public interest. He has also shifted from focussing on specific risk issues on behalf of his clients to addressing the organization-wide capacity to conduct risk assessment and developing enabling technologies to allow for more robust risk assessment work within the client organizations. He was particularly fortunate to work with Public Safety Canada and the Defence Research and Development Canada (DRDC) in the development and application of the All-Hazards Risk Assessment Methodology for Whole-of-Government application of Emergency Management. During the same period, he was working with the Canadian Conservation Institute in applying risk management methods to the preservation of cultural property with hazards ranging from theft, to sunlight and humidity ruining paintings, to toxic ink destroying the very documents that record history.
One example of an organization-enabling technological achievement has been the development of FDA-iRISK (with RSI colleagues Todd Ruthman, Hong Duan and Emma Hartnett, and colleagues Yuhuan Chen, Regis Pouillot, Jane van Doren and Sherri Dennis from the US Food and Drug Administration). This technology allows food safety professionals from all over the world to develop robust, rapid risk assessments ranging from simple models to highly complex models including quantitative characterization of natural variability and epistemic uncertainty (applying so-called 2-Dimensional Monte Carlo simulation). In addition, this tool has the capacity to span microbiological, chemical, allergenic and nutritional aspects of food safety. This tool was chosen as one of six finalists for the HHSInnovates awards within the Department of Health and Human Services in the US.
The most recent phase of his work is to engage with diverse organizations in the journey toward the concept of “risk-based decision-making”. The concept of being “risk-based” within organizations is somewhat pandemic in its spread throughout regulatory organizations around the world. It has been described in the literature as a “badge of legitimacy.” Despite the pandemic nature, it is rarely ever defined and there is no roadmap. This presents a problem and an opportunity. One particularly satisfying engagement was, in working with RSI colleagues and colleagues from the Alliance of Blood Operators (the suppliers of blood products in most highly developed countries), to develop a Framework for Risk Based Decision-making for Blood Safety. He was also pleased to contribute to the University of Pennsylvania Law School’s “Best-in-Class Regulator Project, where he was tasked to define “The Analytical Capabilities of a Best-in-Class Regulator.” (link) This was followed by a series of similar engagements (some spanning many years) to develop Frameworks (and the methodologies within them) in the areas of the safety of Engineered Devices (elevators, escalators, boilers, pressure vessels, fuel distribution and pipelines), across four modes of transportation (Transport Canada) and across a diverse Environmental Enforcement mandate ranging from greenhouse gases, toxic emissions, to smuggled endangered species (Environment and Climate Change Canada).
Works and Accomplishments
In 2011, Greg Paoli was awarded the Distinguished Lectureship Award given jointly by the Society for Risk Analysis (www.sra.org) and the scientific society, Sigma Xi.
References
- Recent Advances in Probabilistic Dose–Response Assessment to Inform Risk-Based Decision Making Chiu, W.A. and Paoli, G.M., 2020. Risk Analysis, https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/risa.13595
- 'Beyond the RfD’: Broad Application of a Probabilistic Approach to Improve Chemical Dose-Response Assessments for Noncancer Effects Chiu, W. A., D. A. Axelrad, C. Dalaijamts, C. Dockins, K. Shao, A. J. Shapiro, and G. Paoli. 2018', Environ Health Perspect, 126: 067009. https://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/doi/10.1289/EHP3368
- Key Analytical Capabilities of the “Best-in-Class” Regulator. Paoli, G. and A. Wiles. Penn Program on Regulation Research Paper. 2015. https://www.law.upenn.edu/live/files/4710-paoliwiles-ppr-researchpaper062015pdf
Extra-curricular Activities
Greg is married (20+ years!) with two sons. To attempt to stay in shape, he runs 5-10K distances and plays soccer with men 20-30 years younger (time to transition to Old Timers league, you might well ask? Probably, yes.). He also enjoys downhill skiing with annual family trips to mountains in Western North America. Greg also plans to return to hockey after taking a few years off, and after they re-open Ottawa's local arenas and outdoor rinks post-pandemic). He is also looking forward to “Empty Nest” status and the resulting freedom to travel outside of the summer months.