Prof. Dr. Ali Osman Öztürk was born in 1972 in the Emet district of Kütahya. After completing his primary, secondary, and high school education there, he began his undergraduate studies in 1991 in the Public Administration Department of the Faculty of Political Sciences at Istanbul University. Upon graduating with honors from the Faculty of Political Sciences, he obtained a master’s degree in 1997 in the Department of Labor Economics at the Faculty of Economics of the same university, specializing in "Social Policies and Industrial Relations of the European Union."
In 1997, he enrolled in the doctoral program in Labor Economics at Istanbul University and, after completing the second year of his doctoral studies, he went to the United States in August 1998. At Cornell University, one of the most prestigious universities in the U.S., he pursued language studies and continued his research in labor economics and human resources. Deciding to continue his graduate studies in the U.S., he began his doctoral studies in the Department of Public Administration at North Carolina State University in 2000. He completed his Ph.D. in 2005 as a full-time teaching assistant. Due to his success in developing and offering research methods courses in political science online, he was awarded the “Outstanding Research Assistant” award.
The same year he received his Ph.D., he started working as a coordinator in the Public Sector Leadership bachelor’s completion program at the university, which was still in the project phase. He played an active role in every stage of structuring the LPS program, from creating the academic program infrastructure to developing the curriculum. In 2008, he was appointed as the director of the LPS program and a lecturer in the Faculty of Public Administration and International Relations. Despite the university’s program budget cuts due to the global financial crisis that began the same year, the LPS program, under Prof. Öztürk’s leadership, succeeded in generating financial returns without requiring a share of the faculty budget. During his tenure as LPS Program Director, he taught "Leadership in the Public Sector" courses and published articles in prestigious academic journals (SSCI, etc.).
Between 2008 and 2010, Prof. Öztürk also participated in educational activities outside the university. Within the context of the Certified Public Manager (CPM) program, which is considered highly effective in the U.S. public sector, he provided Management Practices training and project consultancy to senior executives in the State of North Carolina.
Prof. Dr. Öztürk continued his academic career at Istanbul Commerce University from his return to Turkey in the summer of 2011 until October 2014. There, in addition to his role as a faculty member in the Department of Political Science and International Relations, he served in various administrative positions such as Bologna Process Coordinator, department head, and Director of the Leadership and Entrepreneurship Application and Research Center. He became an associate professor in Public Administration in 2013 and a full professor in 2018. He later served as a faculty member in the English Department of Political Science and Public Administration at Istanbul Medipol University. While continuing his academic activities in Turkey, he maintained his connection with the LPS program he founded in the U.S., teaching leadership courses to North Carolina State University students online between 2011-2015. Prof. Dr. Ali Osman Öztürk has numerous internationally and nationally published works in areas such as new public administration, entrepreneurship in the public sector, business ethics, and research methods in social sciences.
In addition to his academic career, from 2014 to 2018, Dr. Öztürk appointed respectively as the advisor to the Prime Minister, Chief Advisor to the Prime Minister, and the Coordinator of Public Diplomacy at the Prime Ministry of Türkiye. He was also as a board member of the Turkish Radio Television -TRT- between 2017 and 2021. Currently, he has been serving as the rector of Hitit University, Türkiye. Dr. Öztürk is married with two children.
