BrainAligned Leadership Institute

Developing people. Strengthening relationships. Creating meaningful impact.

Our mission is to advance our understanding of human thought, emotion, and behavior through scientific inquiry, and translate that knowledge into evidence-informed education and practical development that helps individuals grow, strengthen relationships, and create meaningful impact.

Join the InquiryEnter the four worlds

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The institute

BrainAligned Leadership Institute explores how science, human development, and lived experience can inform the way people lead themselves, connect with others, and contribute to the organizations and communities around them.

Our work brings together neuroscience-informed leadership, emotional intelligence, character development, and organizational research to examine a fundamental question:

How does developing the individual translate into meaningful and measurable improvement for others?

  1. 01Science
  2. 02Self
  3. 03Others
  4. 04Impact

01 · Science

What research can, and cannot, tell us.

SCIENCE — Understanding what research can, and cannot, tell us about human behavior, leadership, and development.

Current areas of inquiry

  • Emotional intelligence
  • Neuroscience-informed leadership
  • Character development
  • Team relationships
  • Organizational culture
  • Mindfulness
  • Attentional control
  • Human performanceParticularly within high-pressure and high-reliability environments.

01Research

Current Areas of Inquiry

BALI is being developed alongside an evolving program of scholar-practitioner research. Current areas of inquiry include emotional intelligence, neuroscience-informed leadership, character development, team relationships, organizational culture, mindfulness, attentional control, and human performance—particularly within high-pressure and high-reliability environments.

We are especially interested in understanding whether, how, and under what conditions individual development produces measurable change beyond the individual.

01Our guiding principle

How we earn trust

“The strength of our claims should never exceed the strength of our evidence.”

We approach research and human development with curiosity, intellectual humility, and a commitment to distinguishing established scientific findings from emerging ideas and unanswered questions.

01Research

Scholarly rigor, practical use.

Research is the rigorous, scholarly side of BALI: research questions drawn from real leadership practice, careful methods, and ethical commitments to the people who take part.

Questions
Grounded in what leaders and teams actually face.
Projects & methods
Designed to test ideas, not to confirm them.
Ethics
Respect for participants and their lived experience.
Participation
Calls for participants and collaborators as studies open.

01Insights

The translation layer.

Insights translate what we are learning into evidence-informed commentary that leaders and practitioners can use. One line of thinking we are developing traces how development travels outward:

  1. Brain
  2. Emotions
  3. Character
  4. Behavior
  5. Culture
  6. Performance

An emerging model we are developing and testing, not a settled conclusion.

Read Insights & Inquiry

02 · Self

Developing the capacity for intentional growth.

SELF — Developing awareness, emotional intelligence, character, resilience, and the capacity for intentional growth.

Six capacities

  • AwarenessNoticing how we think, feel, and react, especially under pressure.
  • Emotional intelligenceRecognizing and working with emotions, our own and others’.
  • CharacterThe values and strengths that guide what we do when it matters.
  • ResilienceRecovering, adapting, and growing through difficulty.
  • Intentional growthChoosing who we want to become, and practicing it.
  • Mindfulness and attentional controlStaying present, and choosing where our attention goes.

02Self

Development starts with one person.

BALI’s work begins with the individual rather than the organization. When one person grows in self-awareness, emotional intelligence, and character, the effect rarely stays with them: it reaches the people they lead, the teams they belong to, and the communities they serve.

02Resources

A library in the making.

BALI’s resource library is being assembled. It will house useful research, reading lists, tools, assessment information, downloadable materials, and, over time, resources developed by BALI itself.

Research library
Studies and reviews worth reading.
Reading lists
Curated by theme: self, others, impact.
Tools & assessments
Including emotional intelligence assessment information.
BALI publications
Our own materials, as the work matures.
Found something we should read?

03 · Others

How people connect, build trust, and grow together.

OTHERS — Examining how individuals connect, communicate, build trust, develop others, and work together.

In relationship

  • ConnectUnderstanding, empathy, and meaningful relationships.
  • CommunicateListening as carefully as we speak.
  • Build trustThe foundation every team depends on, earned over time.
  • Develop othersRecognizing potential others may not yet see in themselves.
  • Work togetherHow individual strengths become collective performance.

03People

The founding team.

BALI brings together executive operations leadership, emergency medicine, developmental science, and behavioral neuroscience: scholars and practitioners who have spent their careers developing people.

Meet the team
  • Andrew Backman

    Founding team

    Andrew Backman

    Executive Leader · Human-Centered Leadership & Organizational Development · Founder, BrainAligned Leadership Institute

    • 30+ years leading teams and operations
    • Executive DBA student, Temple University Fox School of Business
    • Veteran, U.S. Marine Corps and Massachusetts Air National Guard

    LEADx Certified EQ Facilitator & Coach

    Full profile
  • Jennifer Gallant-Backman

    Founding team

    Jennifer Gallant-Backman

    Director of Operations, DispatchHealth · Licensed Paramedic · CFO, Gallant Enterprises · DBA Student · Operations & Analytics Leader

    • Director of Operations, Massachusetts, DispatchHealth
    • Licensed paramedic; 12 years as a firefighter and paramedic
    • DBA student, Jacksonville University
    Full profile
  • Richard Melloni Jr., PhD

    Founding team

    Richard Melloni Jr., PhD

    Professor of Psychology and Behavioral Neuroscience, Northeastern University

    • Professor of Psychology and Behavioral Neuroscience, Northeastern University
    • 30+ years researching the neurobiology of aggression and anxiety
    • 70+ peer-reviewed articles
    Full profile
  • Jonathan M. Tirrell, PhD

    Founding team

    Jonathan M. Tirrell, PhD

    Director, Vuslat Foundation Generous Listening and Dialogue Initiative · Research Professor, Jonathan M. Tisch College of Civic Life, Tufts University

    • Developmental scientist, Tufts University
    • Associate Editor, Character Development, Applied Developmental Science
    • Managing Editor, Journal of Character Education
    Full profile

04 · Impact

From one person to the communities around them.

IMPACT — Studying how individual and relational development influences teams, organizations, and communities.

How development travels

  • IndividualAwareness, character, and capability.
  • TeamTrust, communication, and shared performance.
  • OrganizationCulture, leadership, and decision-making.
  • CommunityHealthier families, workplaces, and neighborhoods.

04Our vision

What we aspire to achieve

Better people.Stronger connections.Lasting impact.

A world in which people continually strive to become better versions of themselves, inspiring positive change that extends beyond the individual to strengthen relationships, teams, organizations, and communities.

04Initiatives

The applied laboratory.

Initiatives are where BALI’s ideas meet real people, real pressure, and real outcomes, and where what we learn begins to inform the research.

Emerging initiative · with Fishing for the Mission 22

Veteran & First Responder Emotional Intelligence Initiative

In collaboration with Fishing for the Mission 22, BALI is supporting an emerging initiative focused on emotional intelligence development among veterans and first responders.

The initiative incorporates emotional intelligence assessment and individualized developmental coaching using LEADx tools and training, while creating opportunities to learn from participants’ lived experiences and explore how intentional individual development may influence self-awareness, relationships, leadership, and well-being.

As the initiative develops, insights from this work may also help inform future scholar-practitioner research into human development within high-pressure and high-reliability environments.

Explore initiatives

Assessment & coaching

LEADx Emotional Intelligence Assessment & Coaching

BALI incorporates LEADx emotional intelligence assessment and coaching tools as part of its developing approach to individual growth and applied leadership development.

What comes next

Room for the next initiative.

Future initiatives in civil construction, leadership development, veteran and first-responder communities, and other high-pressure settings may sit alongside this work as the institute grows.

Science · Self · Others · Impact

Become. Connect. Contribute.

  • Become a better version of ourselves.
  • Connect with others through understanding, empathy, and meaningful relationships.
  • Contribute to something greater than ourselves by helping others discover and develop their own potential.

Across BALI’s founding team

  • 30+years leading teams and organizations
  • 70+peer-reviewed articles in behavioral neuroscience
  • 4disciplines: neuroscience, developmental science, operations, emergency medicine

Join the Inquiry

Good research begins with good questions.

BALI welcomes ideas, research, observations, constructive challenges, and opportunities for collaboration from researchers, practitioners, leaders, veterans, first responders, students, and others interested in understanding how people develop and how that development influences those around them.

If you have encountered research we should read, a question worth investigating, a phenomenon you’ve observed, or an idea that challenges our assumptions, we’d like to hear from you.

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Questions

About the institute

What is BrainAligned Leadership Institute?

BrainAligned Leadership Institute (BALI) explores how science, human development, and lived experience can inform the way people lead themselves, connect with others, and contribute to the organizations and communities around them. Its work brings together neuroscience-informed leadership, emotional intelligence, character development, and organizational research.

What question does BALI study?

BALI examines a fundamental question: how does developing the individual translate into meaningful and measurable improvement for others? It is especially interested in whether, how, and under what conditions individual development produces measurable change beyond the individual.

What are BALI’s current areas of inquiry?

Emotional intelligence, neuroscience-informed leadership, character development, team relationships, organizational culture, mindfulness, attentional control, and human performance, particularly within high-pressure and high-reliability environments.

What is the Veteran & First Responder Emotional Intelligence Initiative?

An emerging initiative, in collaboration with Fishing for the Mission 22, focused on emotional intelligence development among veterans and first responders. It incorporates emotional intelligence assessment and individualized developmental coaching using LEADx tools and training.

Who can join the inquiry?

Researchers, practitioners, leaders, veterans, first responders, students, and anyone interested in how people develop and how that development influences those around them. Share research, submit an idea, propose a collaboration, or ask about initiatives through the form on this page.

Join the Inquiry