Higher Education
Zaag University
President and Vice-Chancellor
Status · development
A new university being developed with a distinctive academic model, governance framework and long-horizon institutional design.
Writer · Advisor · Institution Builder
Building institutions,
systems, ideas
and stories.
David Gehry is a writer, policy advisor, consultant and institution builder working across education, healthcare, public systems, culture and technology.
A note
I am interested in how ambitious ideas become functioning institutions — and what happens when the systems people depend on are designed poorly, built incompletely or allowed to stop evolving.
— David
Current focus
What I am working on
A short list of areas receiving active attention right now.
01
Building Zaag University
Leading the development of a new university — its academic model, governance, operating systems and institutional shape.
02
QED Groups' institutional ecosystem
Developing the operating architecture, ventures and long-term structure behind QED and its pillars.
03
Writing and publishing
Essays, articles and forthcoming books on institutions, policy, healthcare, education and public systems.
04
Policy and systems advisory
Advising leaders on turning broad objectives into implementable systems and durable structures.
05
Podcast and video production
Ongoing conversations with builders, thinkers and practitioners in education, healthcare and public life.
Featured work
Institutions & ventures
Institutional Ecosystem
QED Groups
CEO and President
Status · active
A group building ventures, systems and platforms across sectors — with a shared operating philosophy of building things intended to matter.
Public Systems
Healthcare & Emergency-Service Systems
Advisor · Practitioner
Status · active
Ongoing work on the operating systems that make healthcare and emergency response reliable — where the failure mode is not academic.
Selected writing
Ideas, essays & commentary
- essay5 min read
What It Actually Means to Build a University
A note from inside the work — on the difference between founding an idea and constructing an institution.
A university is not primarily a set of buildings. It is a long agreement about what a society is willing to take seriously enough to sustain across generations.
EducationInstitution BuildingLeadership - essay4 min read
Why Institutions Need Operating Systems
Most ideas do not fail at the level of ambition. They fail at the level of the machinery required to sustain them.
A university, a hospital and a policy program have more in common than the sectors that produce them suggest. Each is a promise held together by a set of internal systems most people never see.
Institution BuildingSystems & OperationsLeadership
Ideas across formats
The same body of work, read, watched, heard.
In David's voice
I am not interested in titles. I am interested in whether the thing works — for the student, the patient, the citizen who will never see the room in which the decision was made.
— David Gehry
Get in touch
Begin a conversation.
For advisory engagements, speaking, media inquiries and collaborations — separate pathways route you to the right place.