Mark Bertolini isn't your typical suit. Honestly, if you saw him 20 years ago, you might have caught him barreling down a Connecticut highway at 120 mph in a BMW, fueled by a cocktail of agony and painkillers. This was a man at the absolute edge. Today, he's the guy who basically forced the insurance industry to acknowledge that "mindfulness" isn't just for people in Lululemon leggings.
As the former Aetna CEO, Bertolini became a bit of a corporate legend, not just for the massive $69 billion merger with CVS Health, but for how he tried to humanize a notoriously "nasty" business. He’s currently steering the ship at Oscar Health as CEO and recently took on the role of Chairman at Verizon in late 2025. But to understand why he matters now, you have to look at the wreckage he crawled out of to get here.
The Accident That Broke the CEO
Most corporate bios are boring lists of Ivy League degrees. Bertolini’s is a medical thriller.
In February 2004, he was skiing in Vermont with his family. He lost control, hit a tree, and plummeted into a ravine. The damage was catastrophic: five broken vertebrae and a bundle of nerves torn completely away from his spinal cord. Doctors actually gave him last rites in the helicopter.
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He survived, obviously. But the aftermath was a nightmare of chronic pain. For years, he was on a rotating cycle of heavy narcotics. He once described the feeling as being "stoned" but still in agony. It was during this "dark night of the soul" period that he almost drove his car off the road for good.
Instead of checking out, he pivoted. He started practicing yoga and meditation. Not because he was a "hippie," but because nothing else worked. He eventually realized he couldn't "fix" the pain, but he could change how his brain processed it. He still can’t use his left arm fully—he often has to open bags of chips with his teeth—but he transformed that physical limitation into a leadership philosophy.
Why the Aetna CEO Raised Wages (When Nobody Asked)
In 2015, Bertolini did something that made Wall Street lose its mind. He raised the minimum wage for Aetna's lowest-paid workers to $16 an hour. Some employees saw a 33% pay bump overnight.
Why? Because he realized some of his own customer service reps were on food stamps.
He figured out that if a worker is worried about putting dinner on the table, they probably aren't going to give great service to a customer dealing with a cancer diagnosis. It wasn't just charity; it was "preventive disruption." He also slashed out-of-pocket medical costs for those same employees.
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The Yoga Experiment
He didn't stop at wages. He brought the same meditation and yoga that saved his life into the office.
- The Data: He didn't just tell people to breathe; he measured it.
- The Result: Employees reported a 28% reduction in stress and a 19% reduction in pain.
- The Money: Aetna saw a productivity gain worth roughly $3,000 per employee per year.
It turns out that when people aren't vibrating with anxiety, they actually do their jobs better. Who knew?
The CVS Merger and the Pivot to Oscar Health
By the time 2018 rolled around, the Aetna CEO was ready for the big one. The sale to CVS Health was a massive $69 billion bet that healthcare should happen in the pharmacy on your street corner, not just in a distant hospital.
After a stint as co-CEO of the hedge fund Bridgewater Associates—which is a whole different kind of high-pressure environment—he landed at Oscar Health in 2023. As of early 2026, he’s still the CEO there, trying to make "insurtech" actually profitable. Oscar was always the cool, techy underdog, but it struggled to make the math work. Bertolini was brought in to provide the "adult supervision" and industry muscle needed to turn a profit.
What Really Matters: Actionable Leadership Lessons
You don't have to be running a Fortune 500 company to take a page out of the Bertolini playbook. Whether you're a manager or just trying to navigate your own career, here is how he actually changed the game:
1. Empathy is a Metric
Bertolini looked at qualitative data (how people felt) and realized it directly impacted quantitative data (the bottom line). If your team is burnt out, you're losing money. Period. Stop looking at "wellness" as a perk and start seeing it as an infrastructure investment.
2. Radical Transparency
He famously told his PR team, "You cannot protect me; you must prepare me." He went on internal message boards and talked to employees directly. If you want people to trust your vision, you have to stop hiding behind corporate jargon and "it's important to note" memos.
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3. Pain is a Teacher, Not Just a Burden
His son’s battle with a rare cancer and his own broken neck forced him to see the healthcare system from the patient’s bed, not the executive’s desk. Use your own "brushes with death"—or even just your professional failures—to find the gaps in how your industry serves real people.
Moving Forward
The story of the Aetna CEO isn't just about insurance. It's about a guy who refused to let chronic pain or corporate tradition dictate his life. As he leads Oscar Health into 2026 and oversees Verizon’s board, the focus remains the same: human capital is the only capital that actually matters in the long run.
If you're looking to apply this in your own life, start by auditing your team's "stress cost." Are you losing productivity because your people are struggling with the basics? Fix the human element first, and the numbers usually follow.
Next Steps for Implementation:
- Audit Internal Stress: If you manage a team, run a survey specifically on "external stressors" (commute, healthcare costs, workspace noise) to see what's draining productivity.
- Personal Resilience: Start a 10-minute mindfulness habit. Bertolini’s data proved it works for corporate performance, not just relaxation.
- Direct Feedback: Skip the middleman. Set up a "town hall" or a digital open-door policy where the lowest-ranking members of your org can speak to the highest.