Chris Blake has formally begun his role as St Vincent’s Health Australia’s Group CEO, taking the reins of public hospitals and aged care across the organisation.
Mr Blake replaces Toby Hall, who departed the not-for-profit earlier in the year.
Mr Blake has held people and leadership roles at the National Australia Bank and Australia Post, where he led one of the largest cultural transformation programs in Australia from 2010-2018. Prior to this, he spent close to 20 years at corporate advisory PwC
He is a Board Member of the Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health, is a member of the Advisory Committee for the Australian Epilepsy Project (AEP), and was previously Chair of the Brain Research Institute.
St Vincent’s is one of the few organisations in Australia that runs both hospitals – public and private – and aged care, with 16 hospitals and 23 aged care services employing 22,000 people across NSW, VIC and QLD.
Mr Blake said he was both excited and humbled by the challenge of leading one of Australia’s oldest and most prominent health and aged care organisations.
“There aren’t too many organisations in Australia that have as long and proud a history and are as admired for their work as St Vincent’s,” he said
“Over 165 years, St Vincent’s Health’s hospitals have been the location of some of Australia’s most important health and medical milestones – from establishing the nation’s first Intensive Care Unit, to leading Australia’s health response to the HIV/AIDS crisis in the 1980s, to ground-breaking transplant surgery, from hands to hearts and lungs.
“I’m honoured to begin this role as Group CEO and join the thousands of St Vincent’s Health team members already committed to the endeavour of delivering high-quality health and aged care services.
“The COVID-19 pandemic has brought rapid change to the health and aged care sectors and there is more to come.
“I look forward to working with our people to address those challenges and create an even stronger, more agile, forward-thinking health and aged care organisation for the 21st Century,” Mr Blake added.
