Mike Kessel

Mike Kessel is a visionary leader in healthcare. His career has been fueled by a passion for healthcare and over 25 years of experience in strategy, finance, organizational behavior, operations, and entrepreneurial ventures. As President and Chief Executive Officer of Cleveland Clinic Canada, he is responsible for leading the development of Cleveland Clinic Canada’s long-term strategy and overseeing its day-to-day operations to ensure the company delivers high-quality care to its patients and clients every day. Mr. Kessel focuses on the growth of Canadian facilities, strategic partnerships, and enterprise value creation. His vision is to build an outstanding team of caregivers passionate about patient and client care and a sustainable organization that can meet patient demand in Canada in the long term.

Mr. Kessel’s impact on the lives of Canadians goes beyond his professional role. As a nationally ranked table tennis player in his youth, he has combined his love of the game with a desire to unite people and give back to create ‘Cardiac Smash’, Canada’s most prominent corporate charity ping pong tournament. As a former Heart & Stroke Foundation of Ontario board member and current member of the Ontario Brain Institute, money from the event goes to support these organizations. Founded in 2015, Cardiac Smash runs in Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver and has raised over a million dollars since its inception. He also holds board member positions at Unyte, a Toronto-based brain health company; Biomendics, an Ohio-based wound care organization; VIQ, a Toronto-based audiovisual capture company; and Solve.care, a health tech company leveraging blockchain to reduce administrative costs. Mr. Kessel is a former committee member of the Conference Board of Canada, an active member of the Young Presidents Organization, and serves on the Maple Leaf chapter’s New Member Committee.  

Before joining Cleveland Clinic Canada in 2009, Mr. Kessel was Co-founder and Vice President of Business Development and Finance for the Center for Partnership Medicine at Northwestern Memorial Hospital/Trio Health in Chicago. In this role, Mr. Kessel was instrumental in developing a network of executive health and wellness programs with leading medical centres throughout the United States. He successfully secured 39 of the 42 Fortune 500 companies based in Chicago as clients.  The program was ranked as one of the top programs in the country by both Forbes and Fortune magazines.

Mr. Kessel graduated from The Ohio State University with a Bachelor of Science in marketing and accounting. He received his certified public accountant (CPA) designation in 1995. He continued his education at Kellogg Business School at Northwestern University in Chicago, where he received his MBA in 2005 with a focus on Marketing, Finance, and Strategy.