Poor Leadership in Healthcare

Poor Leadership in Healthcare

SOLUTIONS WANTED

Poor Leadership

There has been a looming and growing public realization in many countries that healthcare facilities are becoming dangerous places (Walshe & Shortell, 2004). Patient safety has been a dreaded issue in the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand and Canada in connection with a high incidence of errors and injuries. Patient=safety movements and other observers attribute these incidents to major healthcare failures, which have been widely reported by the various media. Of the five major failures, the fourth is the lack of effective management systems (Walshe & Shortell). This, in turn, is caused by poor leadership.

Some organizations are dysfunctional mainly because of poor leadership (Walshe & Shortell, 2004). When analyzed, the problem lies in a single clinician or a small team. He often believes that threats to patient safety are the result of systems failure rather than individual behavior. But in healthcare organizations where this failure occurs, the root is the lack of basic management systems, which conduct regular quality review, incident reporting, and performance management. In organizations of this kind, appropriate systems are ignored or simply not used. There is minimal collaboration between managers and clinicians and poor leadership. Often, these organizations are isolated and have limited viewpoints. They are not open to new learning. Their employees are also often vulnerable, powerless and lacking in initiative to raise important concerns (Walshe & Shortell).

Current Approaches to the Problem

Aware of this disturbing current state of things, the Canadian national health care system promptly recommended radical changes (Goldberg & Page, 2006). But these changes have hardly been implemented to this day. Billions of dollars have been poured into the needed changes but patients throughout the country continue to form long queues in waiting rooms to consult and receive treatment. Many still do not have primary physicians to turn to for their ailments. Emergency rooms remain full. With so much money spent on improving the situations, it is clear that money is not the problem but the lack of effective leadership or poor leadership itself. It has also been reported that 70% of all strategic initiatives and firmed-up plans of change have not been implemented. Those that have been in implementation stages miss out on stated outcomes. Good leadership is the missing solution to address the malaise in earnest. When poor leadership is confronted and solved and the management processes are updated, financial deficits and other deficits will resolve themselves. All the distresses that proceed from poor leadership will gradually diminish. That new and efficient leader need not be extraordinary or out-of-this-world. He can work miracles by simply being human but sensitive, knowledgeable and sincerely attuned to the search of real solutions to real problems (Goldberg & Page).

Are They Working?

As has been reported, 70% of attempted solutions to poor leadership and its major failures have not been implemented (Walshe & Shortell, 2004). Research shows that this is because of barriers to the disclosure and investigation of these major failures. These barriers are the endemic culture of secrecy and protectionism in healthcare facilities, common in every country; fragmented knowledge about these major failures among different individuals; individual self-deception and the tendency to rationalize; simply leaving the facility without the proper disclosure; settled civil actions bound by non-disclosure agreements; and duplication of effort and the costs and the time required to disclose and investigate (Walshe & Shortell).

A Recommended Plan or Approach

A rational plan or approach to solve these major failures and correct poor leadership must begin with formulating systems to identify and highlight those failures (Walshe & Shortell, 2004). The company should offer strong incentives to report irregularities. Second, quality management systems should be more vigorously tested and be ascertained to be able to deal with circumstances of a major failure. Third, the most serious failures must be prioritized and healthcare organizations can learn from one another's ways of doing this. And fourth, there should be a clear mechanism in place that will insure that the lessons everyone learns from major failures are translated into concrete practice. Then these practices are implemented. This last measure requires workable systems to disseminate and share those lessons as well as a proactive approach to monitoring their implementation at every level (Walshe & Shortell).