Mark O'Brien

Mark is the Programme Director of the Oxford Healthcare Leadership Program and an Associate Fellow of the Said Business School.

Mark has had experience in Healthcare since the mid-1980s - first as a Rural Family Physician in Australia with strong links in post-graduate medical education before co-founding the Cognitive Institute, an Australasian Healthcare Risk Management Organisation where he served as Medical Director as well as the International Programme Director of Medical Education and then Hospital Lead in the Risk Prevention division for the Medical Protection Society until March 2021.

He is now an Adjunct Professor in the Faculty of Business, Economics and Law at the University of Queensland and serves as a Non-Executive Director of St John of God Healthcare - a large private hospital group in Australia.

Mark has had a lifelong passion for improving the culture and quality of healthcare. He has provided advocacy, training, consultancy and implementation expertise in healthcare systems and groups in over twenty countries. An estimated 300,000 clinicians across the world have undertaken face to face training in courses developed by him in risk management, leadership, communication skills and performance improvement.

Mark graduated in Medicine from the University of Queensland, obtained a Diploma in Obstetrics from the Royal Australasian College of Obstetrician and Gynaecologists before attaining Fellowships in the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners and the Australian College of Rural and Remote Medicine. He is an Associate Fellow and Certified Healthcare Manager with the Australasian College of Health Service Management, as well as a graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors and the Oxford Advanced Leadership Programme.