The importance of clinical leadership in the hospital setting

Figures & data

Table 1 The characteristics of clinical leadership and the attributes of clinical leaders

Leader characteristics	Leader foci	Leader attributes
Leadership as situational	Context specific	Directly involved in care
	Diagnose microsystem issues	Custodian of care processes and microsystems Reflexivity
Leadership as skill driven	Challenge the process and affect change	Clinical passion and credibility
	Innovative problem solving	Expert knowledge
		Courage
Leadership as value driven	Faith and respect	Professional identity
	Heightened sense of responsibility	Positive attitudes toward own profession
Leadership as vision driven	Translate broader vision into point-of-care delivery	Strategic view
	Interpret managerial agenda for clinicians	Drive
	Provide challenging goals	Sees improvement opportunities Understands improvement techniques
Leadership as collective	Complementarity	Enabling others to act
	Constellation of co-leaders	Advocacy skills
		Approachable
		Works well in team
Leadership as co-produced	All staff have responsibility to lead	Effective communicator
	Interdependent	Able to influence others to act
	In interaction with others	Inter-personal skills
	Networked	Ability to lead a team
Leadership as exchange relationships	Modeling the way	Capacity to enlist colleagues
	Inspiring a shared vision	Role model
		Provides support
		Motivator
		Empowers others
		Supports others
Leadership as boundary spanning	Spans collegial, bureaucratic, interdisciplinary boundaries	Ability to work across teams
	Links across point-of-care microsystems	Systems knowledge

Notes: Table distilled from: Clark 2012;³¹ De Casterle et al 2008;⁴⁷ Edmonton 2009;¹¹ McKeon et al 2009;⁷³ Stanley 2012;³² Patrick et al 2011;³⁴ McKee et al 2013.¹⁹

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