Dr. Leonard J. Marcus (born 1952 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin) is founding Co-Director of the National Preparedness Leadership Initiative (NPLI), a joint program of the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) and the John F. Kennedy School of Government. In recent years, Marcus' research, teaching, and consultation have played a key role in national and international terrorism preparedness and emergency response. He also serves as Lecturer on Public Health Practice and Director, Program for Health Care Negotiation and Conflict Resolution at the Harvard School of Public Health. He is considered a pioneer in the field of health care negotiation and conflict resolution.
At the NPLI, an initiative developed in collaboration with leadership of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the White House Homeland Security Council, the United States Department of Homeland Security, and the Department of Defense, Marcus, along with colleagues Isaac Ashkenazi and Barry Dorn, has pioneered development of the conceptual and pragmatic basis for "meta-leadership"- "overarching leadership that strategically links the work of different agencies and levels of government", and "connectivity" — the coordination of "people, organizations, resources, and information to best catch, contain, and control a terrorist or other threat to the public's health and well-being".
Recent research activities have taken him to the center of leadership dilemmas facing emergency preparedness and response, from direct observation and in-the-moment interviews of central leadership during the 2005 Hurricanes Katrina and Rita on the Gulf Coast to the front lines of the Hezbollah-Israel war in 2006. His article, "Meta-Leadership and National Emergency Preparedness: A Model to Build Government Connectivity" has garnered significant attention. He is leading a five-year CDC project at Harvard and a three-year project with the CDC Foundation to take meta-leadership training to 50 locations throughout the country. At the invitation of the President's Advisor on Homeland Security and Counterterrorism, he has lectured at the White House on meta-leadership to a cross section of senior federal department officials.
Healthcare Negotiation and Conflict Resolution
Prior to being recruited by the federal government following 9/11, Marcus' primary work was in health care negotiation and conflict resolution. Dr. Marcus is founding Director of the Program for Health Care Negotiation and Conflict Resolution at HSPH. He is lead author of the primary text in the field, Renegotiating Health Care: Resolving Conflict to Build Collaboration. The book was selected as co-recipient of the Center for Public Resources Institute for Dispute Resolution 1995 "Book Prize Award for Excellence in Alternative Dispute Resolution". In 1994, he co-authored "Mediating Bioethical Disputes: A Practical Guide". He has written for Newsweek, The Boston Globe, the AMNews as well as a number of scholarly journals.
Marcus has directed numerous projects intended to advance development of the negotiation, collaborative problem solving, and conflict resolution field applied to health related issues. At the Harvard School of Public Health, he has received funding support from, among others, William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the National Institute for Dispute Resolution, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to develop a curriculum, research agenda, and conceptual and applied framework for the field. Dr. Marcus’ research interests have included: implications of conflict in health care services; the uses of mediation for resolving health disputes; and the contributions of conflict resolution to error prevention and patient safety. He collaborated with the Massachusetts Board of Registration in Medicine to develop the Voluntary Mediation Program, the first initiative of its kind to mediate medical practice disputes directly between patients and physicians
Marcus has developed a number of practical applications of mediation and conflict resolution. He has consulted to, trained, or provided executive coaching to leading health care organizations, including Kaiser-Permanente Health Plan, Beth Israel-Deaconess Medical Center (Boston), and the American Medical Association. In 1992, he co-founded Health Care Negotiation Associates (HCNA), a national consulting, mediating, and training organization. His has lectured across North America, the Middle East, Eastern Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean.
Ph.D. Brandeis University, The Florence Heller Graduate School for Advanced Studies in Social Welfare, 1983.
M.S.W., University of Wisconsin, 1974.
B.A., University of Wisconsin, 1973.
Kellogg National Fellowship Program, W.K. Kellogg Foundation, Battle Creek, Michigan. 1986-1989 Concentrations: Conflict resolution and negotiation in health care and international relations.
Harvard University, Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Department of Psychology. Visiting Fellow, Spring term. 1987 Concentration: conflict resolution in the Middle East.
National Institute of Mental Health. Training fellowship administered through Brandeis University. 1978-1980 Concentration: Interorganizational relations.
Marcus, Leonard. Renegotiating Health Care: Resolving Conflict to Build Collaboration. with Dorn, B., Kritek, P., Miller, V. and Wyatt, J. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers. September, 1995. Re-issued in paperback with a new preface, 1999. Translated into Polish by the Foundation for Public Health, 2000.
Dubler, Nancy Neveloff and Marcus, Leonard. Mediating Bioethical Disputes: A Practical Guide. New York: United Hospital Fund. 1994.
Berkman, Barbara; Bonander, Evelyn; Kemler, Beth; Marcus, Leonard; Rubinger, Molly-Jane Isaacson; Rutchick, Irene; Silverman, Phyllis. Social Work in Health Care: A Review of the Literature, Chicago: American Hospital Association, 1988.
Articles from Peer Reviewed Journals
Marcus, L.J., Ashkenazi, I, Dorn, B., & Henderson, J.. “Meta-leadership: Expanding the Scope and Scale of Public Health.” Leadership in Public Health, 8 (1&2), 2008
Marcus, Leonard, Dorn, Barry and Henderson, Joseph. “Meta-Leadership and National Emergency Preparedness: A Model to Build Government Connectivity.” Biosecurity & Bioterrorism. 4:2, Summer 2006
Marcus, Leonard. “A Culture of Conflict: Lessons from Renegotiating Health Care.” Journal of Health Care Law and Policy, 5(2):447-478, 2003
Marcus, Leonard and Dorn, Barry. “Beyond the Malaise of American Medicine.” The Journal of Medical Practice Management, 16:5, March/April 2001
Marcus, Leonard. “On the Bridge between Health Care and Dispute Resolution: Two Common Misconceptions about Change and Managed Care” in Forum. Conflict Resolution and Managed Care: The Challenge of Achieving Both Equity and Efficiency. Washington, D.C.: National Institute for Dispute Resolution, December 1997, Number 34, 11-15.
