John Craig appointed as Chief Implementation Officer of UCLPartners

We are delighted to announce the appointment of John Craig as Chief Implementation Officer of UCLPartners.

In his new role, John will lead on the implementation of health innovation for UCLPartners, working closely with our partner organisations across higher education, NHS providers, integrated care systems and the AHSN Network.

John joins us from Care City, the East London innovation centre for healthy ageing and regeneration, where he has been Chief Executive since 2016. Under John’s leadership, Care City delivered two innovation Test Bed programmes for NHS England and the Office for Life Sciences, a new atrial fibrillation pathway for Barking and Dagenham and social prescribing services to tackle loneliness and isolation.

Prior to joining Care City, John worked as an innovation advisor to a range of non-profits. Until 2015, he spent five years leading Innovation Unit, an independent non-profit that develops radically better, lower-cost public services. He has also worked as a Policy Advisor at the Cabinet Office and at the think-tank, Demos, as a senior researcher. Throughout these twenty years, he has always focused on the transformation of public services.

Dr Chris Laing, Chief Executive of UCLPartners, said: “John has significant innovation-into-practice experience, having led approximately 100 public sector innovation projects, and also brings strengths in leadership and management and developing people and culture. UCLPartners has worked closely with John for many years through our long-standing relationship with Care City, and we are now excited to welcome him to our organisation to lead our partnership work on health innovation implementation.”

Commenting on his appointment, John said: “I am delighted to be joining UCLPartners at a very exciting time for the organisation. I am looking forward hugely to working with its incredible staff and stakeholders to contribute to UCLPartners’ vital mission. Really only this opportunity could have tempted me away from Care City, and I look forward to collaborating with Care City and colleagues from East London in my new role as well as with partners across North Central London and Essex.”

John will take up his new role from 30 August 2022.