John Buchanan is currently a Professor in Working Life in the Discipline of Business Information Systems and Co-Director of the Mental Wealth Initiative at the University of Sydney Business School. He has degrees in History, Law and Economics as well as Ph D in Work and Organisational Studies.

His key domains of expertise are wage determination, workforce development and the role of work in social and technological as well as economic development.

His current research interests concern (i) understanding how mental and not just material aspect of life determine national prosperity and (ii) new directions in occupational reconstruction, especially in the health and social services.

Between 1988 and 1991 he was part of the team that undertook the first Australian Workplace Industrial Relations Survey (AWIRS). He was one of the authors of Australia at work: just managing?(1999) and of Fragmented Futures: New Challenges in Working Life published by Federation Press in 2003. These texts provide an overview of the restructuring of work in Australia since the 1970s.

In 2013 in co-edited a book on Inclusive Growth in Australia: Social policy as economic investment. He is one of the editors of the Oxford Handbook on Skills and Training.

In 2020 he led a multi-disciplinary, international team of researchers preparing a report for UNESCO on the futures of work and education. In recent years, with Jo-An Occhipinti and colleagues, has been researching and publishing on how to better measure and nurture the mental wealth of workplaces, localities and nations.

This has involved collaborations with practitioners in the workers compensation, union and industry superannuation sectors.