Executive team

Damian brings a wealth of leadership experience, having successfully led complex health and community organisations through periods of significant growth, transformation, and strategic development. He has served as a CEO within the Victorian Community Health Sector for over a decade, overseeing significant organisational merges, expansion, and public health responses.

Damian has also demonstrated his expertise in governance and social policy through senior executive roles within the Victorian and New South Wales state governments. He was the inaugural Chair of Mental Health Victoria and is the current Chair of the Victorian Council of Social Service and the North Western Melbourne Primary Health Network. His deep understanding of the mental health service system, operational management, and organisational development makes him well positioned to lead the College in advancing mental health care across Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand.

Australian born, with a career spanning Australian and international, multinational corporations, boutique firms, and pioneering ventures, Jarka is a seasoned C-suite executive and AICD qualified leader. Jarka is focused on cultivating innovative, creative, growth mindset, and values-centric cultures, across diverse industry sectors. Working across a wide range of business verticals, she is adept at creating and navigating dynamic agendas, with extensive experience blending strategic and operational leadership roles. Experienced in HR/IR, Finance, Sales, Marketing, Operations, and Customer Service, Jarka is passionate about orchestrating organisational transformations and harmonizing diverse teams into cohesive, high-performing entities aligned to deliver on strategic and performance agendas. Her operational and strategic acumen, coupled with a relentless commitment to empowering teams and fostering continuous improvement, has delivered enduring results and stakeholder satisfaction throughout her career. As an enthusiastic and collaborative leader, she is dedicated to shaping workplace ecosystems where individuals thrive, and collective objectives are realised. Jarka is an effective and empathetic communicator with a strong values and behaviour framework, inspiring vision and enthusiastically leading goal-focused teams with purpose and passion.

Next to her day job, Jarka is a sailing enthusiast. Passionate about equity and seeing individuals identify, embrace, and wholeheartedly live into their full potential, she is a sailing coach, member of the Australian Sailing She Sails committee set up to encourage and support female participation, and is part of the Caritas Australia Board, and a Victorian Homeless Fund Committee Member.

Mark’s core passion is achieving service excellence and building high-performing teams. As a CFO, he leverages financial experience across corporate, not-for-profit, government and member organisations, including the RACGP. Mark develops and implement financial strategies that drive efficiency, support growth and enhance the quality of frontline service delivery. He believes strong financial leadership is linked to fostering a collaborative and successful team culture.

Phil is a strategic communications leader with extensive senior experience in media, public affairs, government relations, community engagement, events and employee communications. He has led multi-disciplinary teams in the public health and emergency management sectors, focussed on building community resilience, improving access to care and better patient outcomes. Phil also has more than a dozen years’ experience in major metropolitan media newsrooms as a newspaper journalist and television chief of staff.