Content area
Full Text
Introduction
This paper presents the findings of a three-phase study, which aimed to strengthen nursing, midwifery and allied health professionals’ (NMAHP) leadership practice in the UK across a range of practice-based contexts. The study, funded by The Burdett Trust, intended to identify what NMAHP leadership strategies work, why and for whom. The outcome was five “guiding lights”, a metaphor describing the salient features of leadership that reflect a strong relationship and value-based approach relevant to contemporary health and social care. The term “guiding lights” has been coined in preference to “simple rules” used by other researchers when translating complex insights or findings into principles based on realist reviews undertaken by Best et al. (2012) and Plsek and Wilson (2001). The project also created a vision for the future of leadership through a narrated visual presentation at: https://hml.helix.uws.ac.uk/Play/17172, a leadership impact framework and 360-degree feedback tool to facilitate practitioner self-reflection and assessment.
Over the past couple of years, there has been a noticeable philosophical shift in understanding how leadership impacts culture, quality, safety, staff and patient experience in health and social care (Cardiff et al., 2020; Manley and Jackson, 2020; Manley et al., 2019). This shift has prompted debate about the need to identify what works well in both formal leadership programmes, as well as in workplace teams and organisations. It is especially important in a pandemic world that NMAHP leadership contributions are visible and valued in all international contexts and literature (Duignan et al., 2020; Bell and Colleran, 2018). UK evaluations of leadership programmes (Hocking et al., 2020; University of Manchester, 2017) is heavily weighted towards the NHS, exclude social care and do not identify:
what difference they make in practice longitudinally,
whether there is any cost-benefit for system investment,
what impact they have on reducing workforce inequalities or on improving patient and staff outcomes.
The purpose of this paper is to contribute to this debate by presenting the principles for strengthening nurse, midwifery and allied health professionals’ leadership distilled through the lens of a realist evaluation and appreciative inquiry approach.
Aim of the study and research questions
The study aimed to identify the enablers, processes and indicators that nurse, midwife and allied health professional leaders use to achieve and demonstrate...