Leading and Managing Health Services by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 2015-05-06T16:00:00+00:00

Strategic networking

When health service managers begin the delicate transition from functional manager to organisational leader, they start to concern themselves with broad strategic and organisational issues. Lateral and vertical relationships with other functional or business unit managers outside the immediate control of the health service manager become important links, indicating how their own contribution fits into the organisational picture. Thus, strategic networking links ‘the aspiring leader into a set of relationships and information sources that collectively embody the power to achieve personal and organisational goals’ (Ibarra & Hunter, 2007, p. 43).

As an example, clinical directors, nurse unit managers or allied health department heads may be thrust into a clinical leadership role due to their organisational skills or because of seniority. The rise in managerialism in healthcare reflects organisational demand for efficiency and effectiveness in the delivery of healthcare services. The demand for innovation and continuous improvement in quality of health service delivery and the relentless push to improve productivity in the model of service delivery are about changing the behaviour of clinicians and patients. The clinical manager is well placed to influence these outcomes.

Leadership for successful innovation for the clinical manager often involves leadership skills like the exercise of political astuteness and the development of alignment and sometimes coalitions across different interests implicated by the innovation, in both formal and informal alliances. It involves mobilising existing relationships and developing new ones to encompass the range of practices involved in innovation, as well as seeking funding from the board or department of health (Storey & Holti, 2013).

It is important that the healthcare organisation provides the right environment for the clinical leader or manager to develop properly (Leggat & Balding, 2013). The health service organisation should facilitate networking training in areas like communications, leadership and organisation, human resources and financial systems, and policies and procedures. Networking skills are a capability that can be learned by the transitioning clinician.

The shift from clinician to clinical manager also involves a shift in mindset. Many managers need to change their attitudes about the necessity for networking. For the clinician, the mindset must shift from the highly valued individual patient focus to organisational objectives, from a narrower clinical focus to a broader organisational and strategic focus. This can often result in a challenge to their identity, from having personal clinical credibility to having a role in management of people and resources, in which they are less confident. The clinical manager will need organisational support to gain the required management credibility in this new role. At a personal leadership level, unless clinical managers shift their mindset about valuing their management role, they will not allocate sufficient time or effort to getting the job done.

The transition from clinician to manager can be greatly assisted by maintaining clinical networks and leveraging these to develop and support the building of necessary management skills. By encouraging the sharing of ideas around intractable clinical process problems, a clinical manager’s management challenges can be more effectively addressed.

Organisations can support clinician managers by providing opportunities for internal networking with other managers and encouraging attendance at suitable external events.

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