Building Interdisciplinary Leadership Skills among Health Practitioners in the Twenty-First Century: An Innovative Training Model

Abstract

Transformational learning is the focus of twenty-first century global educational reforms. In India, there is a need to amalgamate the skills and knowledge of medical, nursing, and public health practitioners and to develop robust leadership competencies among them. This initiative proposed to identify interdisciplinary leadership competencies among Indian health practitioners and to develop a training program for interdisciplinary leadership skills through an Innovation Collaborative. Medical, nursing, and public health institutions partnered in this endeavor. An exhaustive literature search was undertaken to identify leadership competencies in these three professions. Published evidence was utilized in searching for the need for interdisciplinary training of health practitioners, including current scenarios in interprofessional health education and the key competencies required. The interdisciplinary leadership competencies identified were self-awareness, vision, self-regulation, motivation, decisiveness, integrity, interpersonal communication skills, strategic planning, team building, innovation, and being an effective change agent. Subsequently, a training program was developed, and three training sessions were piloted with 66 participants. Each cohort comprised a mix of participants from different disciplines. The pilot training guided the development of a training model for building interdisciplinary leadership skills and organizing interdisciplinary leadership workshops. The need for interdisciplinary leadership competencies is recognized. The long-term objective of the training model is integration into the regular medical, nursing, and public health curricula, with the aim of developing interdisciplinary leadership skills among them. Although challenging, formal incorporation of leadership skills into health professional education is possible within the interdisciplinary classroom setting using principles of transformative learning.

Leadership in nursing: from teaching to practice in a hospital environment

“…7 For this purpose, it is necessary to make changes in the academic field that allow an innovative didactic-pedagogical restructuration, 10,11 in which the teacher will have a fundamental role in the learning process.…”

Medical leadership: interns’ perception on leadership skills: a qualitative study from Chennai

“…In the free list exercise, the various 20 perceived attributes for effective medical leadership based on descending order of Smith's S value were as follows (1) unbiased (2) communication skills (3) patience (4) receptive (5) knowledgeable (6) honest (7) selflessness (8) self-confident (9) self-discipline (10) bold (11) guide (12) polite (13) punctual (14) friendly (15) motivate (16) helping (17) brave (18) leading (19) decision making (20) courageous (Table 1). These items were then subjected to pile sorting exercise (Figure 1).…”

“…18 Innovation collaborative study by Public Health Foundation of India (PHFI) in 2015 highlighted the inadequacies in current medical education curriculum for formal training in medical leadership skills. 19 In the emerging health care scenario, leadership training for medical graduates equips them with a skill set to effectively address the health system related challenges and improve the health care delivery at all levels including primary care, secondary care and tertiary care. Hence we propose a qualitative study to elicit characteristics associated with effective medical leadership among trainee interns at an academic medical institute for future development of such training for medical students.…”

Leadership and the everyday practice of Consultant Radiographers in the UK: Transformational ideals and the generation of self-efficacy

“…[1][2][3] Understanding the underpinning economies of expertise embedded therein, moreover, is widely taken to be a linchpin aspect of advancing effective transformation in practice. [4,5] As Adams [6] notes, " [L]eadership wisdom is an essential component to being successful in a fast-paced, ever-changing, and highly complex health environment." Despite this general trend, however, there remains a lack of research addressing the general matter of leadership in professional radiography, intellectual or otherwise.…”

“…However, and as noted by Hyrkäs and Dende [1] , the practicalities of such roles in clinical work are often ambiguously defined. Early evaluations of the CR role in the UK mirror this concern; Nightingale and Hardy [12] , for example, identify that radiographic professionals promoted into consultancy positions often lack confidence and/or clarity particularly regarding what 4 is expected of them as 'leaders'. It is against this backdrop that this paper aims to the explore the variegated ways in which CRs themselves interpret the expectations, practicalities and ambiguities of the leadership role with which they are charged.…”