Mark Cooke

Mark has held many senior roles in the NHS across all sectors in his 40 year career, including 5 years as CEO of Dudley PCT, Chief Officer of Guernsey’s Health and Social Care Department and various posts as Finance Director and other Board level roles.

He started in local government where he trained as a CIPFA accountant and then moved to the NHS to implement a new Regional Financial system. In the 1990’s Mark was part of a small national team that set up NHS Trusts and developed the NHS Trust performance and regulatory regime and then was part of setting up the Regional Office structure. He moved to a large teaching hospital in East Birmingham as Business Development Director/Deputy Finance Director in the late 1990’s, ultimately becoming its Finance Director and Director of Strategy as the Trust moved to Foundation status. He subsequently moved to the Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health Trust as Deputy CEO and CFO. In his first post as Chief Executive he led the merger of two PCTs in Dudley and established a key working relationship with the local authority, who invited Mark to Chair the Dudley Local Strategic Partnership comprising of local businesses, the voluntary sector and all public sector partners. He also chaired various West Midland Specialised Commissioning Groups and hosted the West Midlands Commissioning Business Support Agency.

He and his family moved to the Channel Islands in 2010 where he ran the Health and Social Care services for the Island and developed their 10 year Health and Well Being Strategy. He moved to the private sector for a short spell as Director of a successful Business Solutions company. In 2015 he returned to the UK to join NHS England in the South West as Director of Commissioning Operations. He has led the strategic development and regulation of the systems and played an active part in the integration pilot with NHS Improvement which has subsequently led to the new national and regional structure for NHS England and NHS Improvement.

In his current role Mark is responsible for the development of Integrated Care Systems in the South West, regional lead for addressing Health Inequalities, population health management, oversight and regulation, improvement, major Service Reconfiguration, Provider transactions (mergers and acquisitions) and major strategic investments. He co-chairs the national Prevention Delivery Group. He also leads strategy deployment within NHSE South West.

Mark has held a number of Community, Governor and Trustee roles in the charitable sector including Every Child Our Future, Parish Council Chair, Church Treasurer and Chair of a Scout Group. He is currently trustee of his local village hall and recreation ground charity, a Multi-Academy Trust, holds a trustee position for the Bristol City Football Club Robins Foundation and most recently has taken up a position as Non-Executive Director for National Centre for Rural Health & Care.

His passion is in whole system approaches to population health improvement and he has recently been made an Honorary Member of the Faculty of Public Health.

Mark lives in rural Somerset with his dog, 3 cats, 5 chickens and fish.  In his spare time he likes walking, reading and playing the saxophone and drums.