Constitution 

The Westmead Institute for Medical Research Constitution is available here.

Board

The Board of The Westmead Institute for Medical Research is comprised of 10 directors, led by Chair, Mr Philip Chronican. It includes appointees of the University of Sydney, the NSW Government, the Westmead Institute for Medical Research Foundation and the Westmead Hospital Foundation.

The Board is responsible for oversight of the policies, strategic direction and management of the Institute.

 

Philip Chronican (Chairman)

Philip is Chairman of National Australia Bank.

In his executive career, he held senior executive roles in the banking industry across Australia and New Zealand in a career that spanned over 35 years. Roles included CEO Australia for ANZ, and Group Executive Institutional Banking and CFO for Westpac Banking Corporation.

He previously served as Chairman of the NSW Treasury Corporation (to September 2019) and as a Director on the Bank of New Zealnd (to February 2019), and both the Banking + Finance Oath, and the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (until December 2018).

Philip O'Connell

Professor O'Connell is an executive director of the Board.

Experience and expertise

Professor Philip O'Connell is Executive Director of WIMR and Director of the Centre for Transplant and Renal Research.

Philip undertook a PhD in endothelial cell adhesion molecules at the University of Melbourne and had further training in transplant immunology as a postdoctoral research fellow with Professor Terry Strom, Harvard Medical School. His major research interests are in the development of islet transplantation as a main stream treatment for type 1 diabetes and the use of genomics as a marker of renal allograft dysfunction.  He was a principle investigator of the NIH funded GOCAR study. He is director of the Australian Clinical Islet Transplant Consortium, which has undertaken Australia’s first multicentre clinical trial of islet transplantation. 

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Elizabeth Jazwinska

Dr Liz Jazwinska (PhD, MBA, GAICD, BSc Hons) has more than 30 years' experience in innovation, technology and business development, and has held senior positions in academia, industry and government in Australia and internationally.

Jazwinska is currently an Independent Board Director and Strategy Advisor, and works to assist not-for-profit organisations build sustainable funding partnerships with commercial and government-owned organisations.

During her full-time career, Jazwinska held senior leadership positions in the following three sectors: Higher Education (Monash University and RMIT University), Government Funding (A*STAR in Singapore, the Ministry of Science and Innovation in New Zealand, and the Australian Research Council) and Industry (Johnson & Johnson Research and GSK).

In 2009, Jazwinska founded the molecular diagnostics company SpeeDx, having already established a substantial academic portfolio in human molecular genteics with authorship of more than 62 publications in high-ranking peer-reviewed journals.

jazwinska holds a BSc (Hons) from Aberdeen University, a PhD from Edinburgh University, and an MBA from the Australian Graduate School of Management. She is also a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.

Michael Rose AM

Michael is the Chair of the Committee for Sydney, an urban policy think tank that advocates better policy outcomes for Sydney. He is also Chairman of Greater Sydney Parklands, a NSW Government body responsible for significant urban parklands in Sydney, and sits on the Board of the Sydney Harbour Federation Trust.

Michael has served on the Boards of a number of Government, arts and not-for-profit organisations, including the UNSW Institute for Global Development, ChildFund International and Sydney Living Museums. He has a senior advisory role at UNSW and is a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.

Julia Strelitz

Julia is a Non-Executive Director.

Julia is a partner at Scyne Advisory and was formerly a partner at PwC. She has 23 years of experience supporting the implementation of operational and financial improvements across the healthcare sector. Her expertise lies in costing and funding, data analysis, financial and operational improvements and benefit realisation/program evaluation.
 

Qualifications

Bachelor of Commerce, University of Witwatersrand, South Africa

Bachelor of Accounting, University of Witwatersrand, South Africa

Member of the Institute of Chartered Accounts in Australia (ICAA).

Special responsibilities

Julia is Chair of the Audit and Risk Committee.
 

Robyn Ward AM

Professor Robyn Ward AM FAHM represents the University of Sydney on the Board.

Professor Robyn Ward AM FAHM joined the University of Sydney in July 2018 as the inaugural Executive Dean of the Faculty of Medicine and Health. She was the former Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) and Executive Dean (Acting) of the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Queensland.
 
Professor Ward is an academic leader, cancer researcher and medical oncologist. She chairs the Commonwealth Medical Services Advisory Committee (MSAC), and serves on the Council and Executive of the Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences. In 2013 she was made Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for significant service to medical research and patient care in the field of oncology.

Graeme Loy

Mr Graeme Loy represents the Western Sydney Local Health District (WSLHD).

Over the last 12 years Graeme has held a number of executive roles, including Chief Executive for NSLHD. His knowledge of both clinical and corporate services includes a strong focus on system performance through healthy relationships.
 
Graeme has accumulated significant experience in all aspects of leadership in both the public and private sectors. He takes great pride being able to deliver highly complex clinical services through high performing teams.
 
His breadth of knowledge spans facility, district and statewide environments and enables him to couple strategic direction with the broader improvement and research goals, including ensuring optimal provision of safe, high quality and timely clinical services in concert with the needs of the community and the health system.
 
With patients as his principle focus Graeme strives to support NSW Health to deliver high quality care and brings a simple motto to each discussion – “What if it was your mum?”

Naseema Sparks

Naseema Sparks is an experienced Chair and Non-Executive Director with relevant expertise in B2C and B2B companies experiencing fast growth. She has a background at both operational and board level in strategic marketing.

Naseema began her career in the pharmaceutical industry with roles in GSK Australia and then Sanofi. As a qualified pharmacist and Master of Pharmacology, she worked in the clinical trials, drug registration and information division of Glaxo and progressively moved to marketing / sales. She was Director of Marketing Strategy for the pharma division when she made a career change into strategic consulting with PwC in Melbourne.

After completing the MBA at Melbourne Business School, she moved to the marketing and advertising industry with senior management and strategy roles at various agencies in UK and Australia. Her most recent executive role was as Australian Managing Director and a Global Partner of communications company, M&C Saatchi.

Naseema began her non-executive director career in 2007 with a place on the board of Blackmores, and has since served on boards of a diverse range of companies including NYSE & ASX listed companies, private companies, Government statutory authorities, not-for-profit arts, health and education boards.

As a director she specialises in guiding pre-IPO organisations to becoming publicly listed and currently chairs two such pre-IPO organisations – one (Openmarkets Group Ltd) in the fintech category and the other (Homart Pharmaceutical Group)  in Vitamins, Supplements and Minerals sector. Her other boards include ASX listed company Australian Vintage Wines Ltd, and she serves on the board of Knight Frank Australia.

Professor Katherine Belov

Katherine Belov AO, BSc (Hons) PhD, University of Sydney Member Appointee Director
 
Professor Kathy Belov is the Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Global Engagement) at the University of Sydney. In this position, she takes responsibility for managing the development and execution of the University’s global engagement strategy. Key priorities are the development of the capacity of academic and professional staff to support international student learning and international research collaborations and to achieve educational excellence in the international arena. She also promotes the University’s position in the international academic and research community and identifies and enables strategic opportunities for partnership and collaboration in research and education. 
 
Kathy’s research is based in the School of Life and Environmental Sciences (SOLES) and her focus is on comparative genomics and immunogenetics of Australian wildlife. Her team study Tasmanian devils, koalas, wallabies, platypus, and many other species. Kathy has received two Eureka awards, the Crozier medal, the Fenner medal and the MJD White medal for her research. 

Maryanne Graham

Ms Maryanne Graham, B Comms, (Journalism and Public Affairs), Chair of the WIMR Foundation Board
 
Maryanne has been providing strategic and operational leadership to both private and public sector organisations for more than 20 years. Her experience includes strategy development, government and stakeholder relations, marketing, customer experience and corporate affairs delivery for some of Australia’s most high-profile organisations and infrastructure projects including her current role as Executive General Manager Corporate and Stakeholder Affairs at Transgrid.

Maryanne's most recent roles are General Manager, Customer Strategy and Engagement at Sydney Water and Executive General Manager Corporate Affairs for the $5.3 billion Western Sydney International Airport.

As a senior executive on large, highly-diverse ASX-listed companies, including Downer Group and Transfield Services, she led the corporate affairs, investor relations, government relations and stakeholder engagement portfolios, with operations spanning more than 43 countries and including the oil and gas, utilities, mining and resources, transport, water, property, engineering and defence sectors.
 
She has extensive experience working across the infrastructure industry and large state-owned corporations and agencies including Transport for NSW and Sydney Motorway Corporation (WestConnex) and as the General Manager Customer, Strategy and Engagement at Sydney Water. She has successfully led a number of large-scale transformation projects and is a passionate advocate for workplace diversity, employee enablement and disruptive technologies.
 
Maryanne is a Non-executive Director of Westmead Institute for Medical Research Foundation, NSW Kids in Need, a Member of the Western Sydney University External Relations Committee and a Member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.

Simon Hall

Simon Hall is the Company Secretary to the Board of Directors and the Chief Operating Officer of The Westmead Institute for Medical Research.

Simon was previously the Manager of the Melbourne Medical School at the University Melbourne where he was responsible for the operational delivery of research and clinical training programs across eight hospitals and regional health services. He has implemented corporate services transformation programs across multiple Australian universities and led international student recruitment operations of several UK and Middle Eastern universities, most recently as Head of International Student Recruitment at the University of Warwick.
 
With a focus on positive stakeholder engagement, Simon has a track record of leading successful operations through high performing teams and positive workplace cultures. He has been heavily involved in local communities through competitive rowing and volunteering with Out for Australia, Orange Sky Australia and the Commonwealth Community Visitors Scheme.
 
Simon holds a Master of Business Administration (MBA) from the Australian Graduate School of Management at the University of New South Wales, an undergraduate degree (BSc Hons) in International Business and Modern Languages from Aston University and is a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors (GAICD).
 

Policies 

The Whistleblower Policy for The Westmead Insititute for Medical Research available here.


The use of animals in medical research and teaching

The position statement relating to the use of animals in medical research and teaching at The Westmead Institute for Medical Research can be found here.