Christine Hallett had a long academic career as a social policy analyst, teaching and researching at the Universities of Oxford, Keele, Western Australia, Leicester and Stirling. She has published, inter alia, on the personal social services, child protection and interagency collaboration, women and social policy and child welfare and juvenile justice. She served as Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Stirling from 2003 until 2010.

She was a Civil Service Commissioner, has held a number of non-executive roles and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.