Thomas Gakis

Thomas Gakis currently serves as Chief Operating Officer for Department of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, a department comprised of 13 divisions and over 675 faculty. Tom began his career in strategy consulting and went on to receive his MBA with a concentration in Quality Management and certification in Health Care Administration from the University of Chicago. Tom’s career has since been focused in academic medicine—the last 15 years in faculty practice administration. In prior roles, Tom served as Chief Administrative Officer and Associate Vice President at UMass Memorial Medical Group and as Administrative Director of the Orthopedics & Arthritis Center and Department Administrator for Orthopedic Surgery at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. Earlier work in the Brigham’s Center for Clinical Excellence exposed Tom to human centered design where he led patient focused service excellence projects across surgical milieus. His approach to faculty practice administration has evolved to incorporate design thinking and lean management principles in pragmatic ways.