Brief Biography
Farheen Akbar, M.P.H., joined OBSSR in 2016 and currently serves as the Executive Secretary for the Behavioral and Social Sciences Research (BSSR) Coordinating Committee. Her focus is on building relationships and enhancing communication with the BSSR community both inside and outside of NIH. She leads BSSR’s integration implementation and evaluation activities, which include enhancing analytics to improve the tracking of BSSR and collaboration, promoting the BSSR workforce, and developing interagency partnerships through such efforts as the White House Social and Behavioral Sciences subcommittee.
Farheen also advises OBSSR’s strategic planning for various efforts, including communication strategy with NIH Institutes, Centers, and Offices (ICOs) and external audiences. She enjoys leading NIH-wide efforts that require innovative problem solving and facilitating cross-disciplinary teams to tackle those issues. She is passionate about team development and is active in staff engagement efforts.
Previously, Farheen took on various roles as the OBSSR team has grown including legislative representative; planning and evaluation representative; Research, Condition, and Disease Categorization expert; and Contracting Officer’s Representative for the office. Prior to joining OBSSR, she spent a number of years at the National Institute on Aging. Prior to joining NIH, she was at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the Office on Smoking and Health.
