Dr. Jennifer Posa, Ph.D. ’93 didn’t set out with a single, fixed plan for her future. Instead, her trajectory unfolded through a series of decision points, each one requiring self-inquiry and honesty.
One of those key moments came when she visited Denison for the first time, an admitted high schooler from New Jersey trying to decide whether to enroll. “When I drove up The Hill, I felt, ‘This is where I want to go.’ It was just so beautiful,” was how she remembered the moment.
She fell into the rhythm of campus life, fully enjoying the social scene and diving into what she thought would be her major in education. But again, Posa’s path diverged. “I went to some education classes my first semester and decided I didn’t want to be an education major,” she said. Instead, she took a psychology class and was immediately hooked. “I quickly changed to a psych major and loved every minute of it.”
In Denison’s close-knit environment, she found both challenge and support — faculty who pushed her intellectually and connections that have endured for decades. By her senior year, she was fully immersed in her studies with an eye toward graduate school, taking an entire course load in psychology and completing an independent thesis project.
But Posa’s most defining decision came at a moment when many expected her to follow a traditional academic path. Encouraged to pursue a Ph.D. in clinical psychology, she pivoted to choose something less certain — and ultimately more formative.
“I needed some experience with life before I could do what I thought I wanted to do,” she said. “I remember having to go to my faculty mentors and say, ‘I’ve changed my plan.’” That choice launched an exciting career shaped by curiosity, adaptability, and a willingness to rethink assumptions — qualities deeply rooted in her Denison education.
Posa moved to Washington, D.C. and entered the workforce. She then pursued graduate study in health management, blending interests in psychology, business, and human performance. Over time, her work evolved into a focus on how people think, behave, and thrive within organizations; eventually she earned her Ph.D. in industrial and organizational psychology.
Today, Posa is an industry leader whose work has influenced some of the world’s most complex and high-risk institutions through data-driven strategies that drive intuitive leadership and peak performance. From her role as Global Head of Employee Mental Well-being and Workplace Effectiveness at Johnson & Johnson — impacting more than 140,000 employees worldwide across 77 different countries— to 17 years advising leadership at Mayo Clinic, Posa has built a career by infusing science into business strategies that build high-performance cultures for organizational success.
Most recently, she served as the inaugural Chief Wellbeing Officer at the Central Intelligence Agency, where she designed and executed the first-ever Congressionally mandated workforce well-being strategy for the U.S. Intelligence Community — a role that required balancing data, human behavior, and the mission-critical performance of a workforce in one of the most demanding environments imaginable.
At the core of her work is a simple but far-reaching belief: “There’s not an aspect of anyone’s life that is not impacted by their state of well-being,” Posa said.
It’s a perspective shaped as much by lived experience as by professional expertise, reflecting the intellectual foundation she built on The Hill decades ago. “Denison helped me discover psychology as an interest area,” she said. “And those classes still have such strong applicability to what I do now, 30 years into my career.”
On May 6, Posa will bring her insights back to the Denison community as part of Share, Lift, Lead, a virtual series designed by the Office of Alumni & Family Engagement to spark connection and meaningful conversation. In her session, Why Well-Being is Critical to our Success, she will guide participants through practical and personal explorations, including a live “Well-being Wheel” assessment that helps individuals consider the many dimensions of their lives.
The session demonstrates both the urgency of the moment and the evolution within her field. In a world defined by disruption, burnout, and persistent demands, Posa emphasizes that well-being is not a luxury — it is essential.
“We have so many opportunities throughout our lives to improve our well-being by making intentional decisions and choices each day,” she said. “Identifying ways to further prioritize wellbeing in our work and lives can exponentially impact our happiness, longevity, and performance levels.”
For Posa, returning to Denison is about more than just sharing knowledge. It’s an opportunity to give back to a community that helped shape her. “At this point in my career, it’s about paying it forward,” she said. “My goal is to ensure the science of wellbeing can help individuals shape better lives and ensure leaders design better workplaces, which will enable us all to have a better future.
Her story is a testament to what happens when students are given space to explore and to question, to ultimately define a career founded in passion and purpose. A Denison education doesn’t prescribe a single path but instead equips graduates to create their own — and to lead others along the way.
“For me, Denison enabled me to embrace my own independence and see my own potential,” Posa said. “I learned who I was and I discovered the impact I wanted to have on the world.”