Typical leadership development activities - When will you feel like a leader? - Health care

Many employers will offer a range of activities, programmes or workshops to help people with their development. Specialist providers may also be used. Activities range from access to assessment tools, an introduction to leadership, through to leadership qualifications. Typically, your journey will begin with:
- self-management
- assertiveness training
- managing difficult conversations
- leading a team
- leading change.

As your skills develop, you will build on these foundations and acquire new skills that help extend your influence and impact:
- coaching others
- influencing others
- leading teams
- leading services
- system leadership
- strategic leadership.


Employers’ expectations of early career healthcare professionals
Employers will want to consider your potential for development throughout your career. They will usually want to explore areas such as personal initiative and interpersonal skills, which are the foundations of future leadership development. Above all else, they will want to know that your values will contribute to excellent healthcare provision.
You may be asked at interview to describe a situation from your personal life where you have taken a leading role. Or you may be asked how you would approach a situation which they describe. These questions are designed to understand if you understand your own impact in leading and what lessons you have learned from them. Think about how you might approach these questions in advance.Time for reflection
What experiences from your personal life might you draw from in order to show an employer what sort of leader you might become?
Some sample interview questions are listed at the end of this chapter.
Your employer will not expect well rounded, appropriate leadership skills in your first years as a practitioner. They will be looking for your interest in your personal development, your insight into your own behaviours and their impact upon others; they will look for any motivation to lead and they will want to see your flexibility of approach in different settings and situations.


When will you feel like a leader?
As a healthcare professional, it is likely that in the work setting the first leadership behaviours you will emulate and be expected to model will be professional. Your professional or specialist leadership will be called upon and expected as a natural part of your day.
In addition to this, your particular profession or specialism may already have role models and norms of behaviour that you will be expected to adopt as part of professional cultural identity norms. While there is an implicit expectation that you will adopt these, bear in mind that you are being inducted into a culture that may have developed over decades. It may not be appropriate in the context of modern health care and society’s expectations. It is your professional responsibility to be accountable for your decisions and your actions and you should beware of conforming to established norms where they conflict with your personal values and the aims of high quality, safe patient care. You are a fresh pair of eyes, educated to a high standard and you should never be afraid to ask why things are done in a particular way. It may well be that there is no good reason to continue with outdated practice and your challenge will benefit the team as well as the patient.
As your career develops, your next leadership challenge is likely to be around the management of others (team leadership) or resources (money, equipment etc.). You will probably be expected to compete for roles where this is an adjunct to your professional career development. In one sense, therefore, the decision about whether you are ready for such responsibilities is shared between you and your employer. However, you will make your own judgement about your suitability and readiness for such roles. All good employers will assess your potential for success in role and be prepared to offer support for the development of skills and experience and to help you with the transition.

The essence of employability is to remain flexible. Being open to consider or reconsider the extent of your aspirations around leadership will mean that, when the time comes, you are in a position to take advantage of the opportunity to take on a greater leadership role and make a successful transition from your professional foundation to a wider leadership role.
The development of leadership skills is a journey, rather than a destination; one that will take you most of your working life. You may feel like a leader now or never feel like one; the key test of leadership is not how you feel but how others feel about what you do. You cannot be a leader unless others follow you.


Tips and trips
You are called on to exercise whatever leadership skills you have, in whatever setting you are, for the express purpose of delivering high quality, effective and safe health care. Any impact upon your personal career and standing with your peers is subordinate to that goal. The tips and trips below are suggestions to help you think through how you will approach this aspect of your work:
Do not pretend to a knowledge or skill you do not have yet.
Do be authentic. Be yourself. Every other option is too hard to maintain in the long run.
Do not take on too much, too early. Confidence is an attractive trait; overconfidence can lead others to mistrust.
Do accept that you will make mistakes as you develop as a leader. Always learn from them and guard against repeating them.
Do not become the sort of leader others want you to be.
Do choose your own style, practice it and refine it.
Do not call yourself a leader. Others are the judge of your leadership skills.
Do lead with purpose, for a purpose.Time for reflection
You in five years’ time
To help you think about your development needs, consider how you would see your future career developing. Think about:

Where you want to be in relation to leadership.
What skills you think you will need when you are there.
What skills you already have.
Bridging the gap:
How are you going to acquire the skills you need?
What is your priority now?
What can wait one year?
What can wait three years?
Potential interview questions in this area

Have you ever had to bring others around to your way of thinking? How did you approach it and what happened?
What has been your greatest challenge? Why? What did you learn about yourself? What would you do differently now?
Describe a situation in which you have led. What happened? Why did it happen?