Dr. Eric Goralnick is the Medical Director of Emergency Preparedness at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, an assistant professor of emergency medicine at Harvard Medical School, an instructor in health policy and management at Harvard TH Chan’s School of Public Health. and a senior associate at Harvard’s National Preparedness Leadership Initiative.

An emergency medicine physician by training, Eric has led a number of initiatives at Brigham and Women’s to improve patient care, reduce wait times, and enable the hospital to serve a broader set of patients. Through this work, he has helped his department move from the 6th to 99th percentile in terms of patient satisfaction, cut wait times by more than a third, and reduce walkouts by half. His techniques draw on principles first developed in lean manufacturing and incorporate cutting-edge research on leadership and team development.

His operational and academic focus is on leadership challenges and response to disasters including the Boston Marathon Bombings, severe weather events, information systems failures, multisite terrorist attacks, active shooters and emerging infectious disease threats.

He has written widely in both the research and media communities, including articles for Fortune and Harvard Business Review and has been the subject of features in USA Today, CBS, the Washington Post, NPR  and the Boston Herald.

A celebrated speaker known for his ability to draw listeners in with tangible, engaging anecdotes, Eric regularly speaks to healthcare, education, and business audiences around the globe.

Eric began his career in the US Navy where he spent seven years as a surface warfare officer. He holds a BS from the US Naval Academy, an MD from Tel Aviv University, and an MS in Healthcare Management from Harvard. He trained in emergency medicine at Yale.