Stephen J. O’Connor, Ph.D., FACHE, is a professor in the Department of Health Services Administration and a Scholar in the UAB Lister Hill Center for Health Policy. He received his B.S. (Microbiology) and M.P.A. (Health Systems Planning) degrees from Indiana University, his M.B.A. degree (health services management) from the University of Dallas, and his Ph.D. (Administration – Health Services) from the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB). O’Connor is board certified in healthcare management as a Fellow in the American College of Healthcare Executives (ACHE). He was previously employed at Parkland Health & Hospital System, and has held faculty positions in the School of Public Health at Saint Louis University, and the School of Business Administration at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
O’Connor directed the UAB Master of Science in Health Administration program from 2000-2009 and has been a Visiting Professor in the Master of International Health Management, Economics, and Policy program at Bocconi University in Milan, Italy and in the Gerald & Patricia Turpanjian School of Public Health at the American University of Armenia in Yerevan. He has also taught at the King Fahad Specialist Hospital in Dammam, Saudi Arabia and has served on the governing boards of a number of healthcare organizations. Currently, he is the United States representative on the Board of the European Academy of Management.
He previously chaired the Health Care Management Division of the Academy of Management. He has served on the editorial boards of numerous journals including the Journal of Healthcare Management and Health Care Management Review. He was editor of the Journal of Healthcare Management, the official journal of the ACHE, from 2010-2014.
O'Connor is twice the recipient of ACHE’s “Health Management Research Award” (1990 with Daniel Raab and 2001 with Richard Shewchuk and David Fine). In 2012, he received the UAB School of Health Professions Excellence in Teaching Award and the John D. and Starr A. Blair Award in Health Organization Management Research from Texas Tech University. He received the Myron D. Fottler Exceptional Service Award from the Health Care Management Division of the Academy of Management in 2013 and, in 2014, the Exemplary Service Award from the ACHE.
He co-edited the book (with S. Robert Hernandez): “Strategic Human Resources Management in Health Services Organizations.” His published research articles have appeared in journals such as Journal of Healthcare Management, Medical Care Research and Review, Health Services Research, Health Care Management Review, Journal of Health Administration Education, Advances in Health Care Management, World Hospitals and Health Services, BMC Health Services Research, Inquiry, Journal of Patient Experience, Quality Management in Health Care, Social Science and Medicine, Health Services Management Research, Journal of Psychological Type, Marketing Research, Journal of Services Marketing, Journal of Ambulatory Care Management, Social Justice Research, Journal of Management Policy and Practice, Health Marketing Quarterly, and Journal of Accounting and Finance.
