Academic

Bain was a lecturer in economics at the University of Manitoba in 1962–63. He was a Research Fellow at Nuffield College, Oxford in 1966-69 and the Frank Thomas Professor of Industrial Relations at the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology in 1969–70. He gave up his chair to become the deputy director of the Economic & Social Research Council's Industrial Relations Research Unit at the University of Warwick, and became Director in 1974, holding the post until 1981. The unit was one of the first attempts in the UK to bring together a large group of social scientists to undertake full-time collaborative research.^[3] In 1979, he was appointed as the Pressed Steel Fisher Chair of Industrial Relations at the University of Warwick.

His research has mainly focused on: white-collar employees and their organisations; the theory of union growth; public policy relating to union recognition and union security, collective bargaining, employee participation and industrial democracy; and the bibliography of industrial relations.  He has been the author or co-author of nine books and monographs and 40 papers in academic journals.^[4]

He was chairman of Warwick Business School from 1983 to 1989,^[5] principal of the London Business School (1989–97),^[6] and President and Vice Chancellor of Queen's University Belfast (1998–2004).^[7][8]

He has also served in several academic professional associations, including:^[1]

• council member, Economic & Social Research Council, 1986–91
• chair, Council of University Management Schools, 1987–90
• vice president, European Foundation for Management Development, 1991–95
• member, Board of Directors, American Assembly of Collegiate Schools of Business, 1992–94
• board member, Foundation for Canadian Studies in the UK, 1993–2001, 2004–06
• chairman, Association of Commonwealth Universities, 2002–03
• trustee, Council for Advancement & Support of Education, 2004–08, and CASE Europe, 2004–07

Public service

Under the auspices of the Advisory Conciliation and Arbitration Service (ACAS) and in a private capacity between 1972 and 1992, he conducted 71 arbitrations and mediations between unions and employers in virtually every sector of the UK economy.^[9] 

He has been a member and the chairman of several commissions of inquiry, including:

• Member, Committee of Inquiry on Industrial Democracy (Bullock Committee), Department of Trade, 1975–76.^[10]
• Member, Senior Salaries Review Body, Department of Trade & Industry, 1993–96, which provides independent advice to the government on the pay of senior civil servants, senior officers of the armed forces, and the judiciary.
• Chairman, Commission on Public Policy and British Business, Institute for Public Policy Research, 1995–97, which investigated the competitive position of the UK economy and the role that public policy should play in improving it.^[11]
• Chairman, Low Pay Commission, Department of Trade & Industry, 1997-2002 and 2008–09, which introduced the National Minimum Wage in 1999.^[12] In 2010, the Institute for Government, following a survey of the members of the Political Studies Association, named the National Minimum Wage the most successful public policy in the UK of the past thirty years.^[13] 
• Chairman, Northern Ireland Memorial Fund, 1998–2002, an organisation offering support to victims of the Troubles.^[14]
• Chairman, Work and Parents Taskforce, Department of Trade & Industry, 2001, which underpinned legislation on work-life balance and flexible working.^[15]
• Chairman, Independent Review of the Fire Service, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, 2002, which provided the basis for fundamental reform in this service.^[16]
• Chairman, Legal Services Review Group, Department of Finance & Personnel, Northern Ireland, 2005–06, which set out a new framework for regulating solicitors and barristers.^[17]
• Chairman, Independent Strategic Review of Education, Department of Education, Northern Ireland, 2006, which put forward a new approach for the strategic planning and organisation of the schools’ estate.^[18]
• Chairman, Independent Review of Policy on the Location of Public Sector Jobs, Department of Finance & Personnel, Northern Ireland, 2013–14, which advanced proposals for relocating public jobs from Belfast to other areas within Northern Ireland.^[19]
• Chairman, Commission on Future of National Minimum Wage and Low Pay Commission, Resolution Foundation, 2013–14.  It recommended, among other things, that the government's economic policy should include an explicit long-term goal to reduce the incidence of low pay and set out a plan to reduce the percentage of employees who earn below two-thirds of the hourly median wage,^[20] which Chancellor George Osborne accepted in his summer budget of 2015.

Non-executive directorships

He has been a non-executive director of several companies in the UK and Canada, including Blackwell Publishers Ltd, 1990–97; The Economist Group, 1992–2001; Canada Life Assurance Company, 1996–2003; Bombardier Aerospace Shorts Brothers Plc, 1998–2007; Electra Private Equity Plc, 1998–2008; Entertainment One, 2007–10; Great-West Lifeco Inc., 2009–14; Canada Life Capital Corporation, 2003–14; and Canada Life Group (UK) Ltd, 1994–2014.^[1]