Bill O’Rourke is a former senior executive at Alcoa, where he worked closely with Paul O’Neill throughout his tenure, including three separate roles leading Alcoa’s Environment, Health & Safety organization. He brings deep, firsthand experience applying the Paul O’Neill Playbook to complex, high-risk organizations.
Since retiring from Alcoa in 2012, Bill has served as a Senior Advisor to Value Capture, working part-time with clients to translate Paul O’Neill’s values, behaviors, and leadership principles into practical, measurable improvement. His experience includes serving as the first President of Alcoa Russia, where he followed Paul O’Neill’s playbook to address a challenging acquisition by focusing on safety as a core organizational value.
Through Value Capture, Bill has helped organizations, particularly in healthcare, understand how leadership behavior and values-based systems can improve safety, culture, and performance. He has seen healthcare organizations organize around employee safety and achieve meaningful, sustained improvement when safety is treated as a true value. His work continues to be guided by a deep respect for Paul O’Neill’s leadership and a belief that getting safety “right” enables organizations to get everything “right.”
Bill lives in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He gives lectures on business ethics, mentors veterans transitioning to civilian careers, and serves on safety and security teams in his community. He also enjoys spending time with his large family in Pittsburgh, where Sunday family dinners remain an important tradition.
“Paul used to say that if you got safety ‘right,’ you could get everything ‘right.'"
