Healthcare Leadership in Challenging Times

At some point in every leader’s career, they are faced with a crisis. One crisis that we did not predict was leading a healthcare team during a pandemic. When we are faced with a challenge, we tend to respond instinctively. This initial impulse may not always be productive, yet none of us have experience when entering a pandemic. A leader needs to be able to act quickly but must have a flexible plan. While managing a new process, they need to communicate with transparency and lead with compassion.

While working in a challenging environment, we need to problem solve, create an action plan and de-escalate the situation. Working together with your team to assess the situation and gathering information will help develop your plan and determine resources needed. Communicating with transparency when connecting with everyone is imperative as we are all in this together. We will continuously monitor and adjust the plan as new information evolves.   

During these challenging times, there is a lot of information at our fingertips. We are in a time where social media content is updated by the minute. Our role as leaders is to develop a relationship with trust with all of our staff. Building trust comes from open communication. In these challenging times, staff want to see and hear from their leaders. A good leader needs to deliver updates quickly and as often as possible. Face-to-face communication may not always be feasible; therefore, it is imperative to have proper follow-up emails or memos sent out ensuring that the message is clear and delivered to each employee. Listen to their questions; if you do not have the answer, let them know but be sure to provide an update as you receive new information. If additional teams or resources are needed to help provide comfort or content, have this in a timely matter. A great example of this is at the start of the pandemic; protective equipment policies changed daily at times, front-line staff started to lose trust, and some did not feel safe. Not being a clinician, my word might not be as powerful as an infection control and prevention clinician. To help ease our staff’s stress and concerns, we arranged for an infection control and prevention clinician to meet with everyone to explain what they need to know and what needs to be done in order to be safe. Use the power of the resources that are available to you.

Management roles in 2020 has made it clear we need to lead with compassion. We need to keep in mind that staff can be stressed, worried or overwhelmed with everything that is happening. Challenging times incorporate pressure and uncertainty, but as a leader we need to keep calm, communicate openly, and be empathetic. The coronavirus pandemic has been mentally, emotionally and physically draining on everyone. As a leader we are tasked to look out for our employees’ well-being. Checking in with staff regularly, asking how they are doing and seeing what we can help with is imperative to this role. A working relationship for a leader entails you being there for your team, and essentially being their support line. Staff need to feel comfortable to raise concerns or ask questions without fear of being blamed or seen as negative. What they do need to understand is this could result in difficult conversations, especially if repeated at-risk behaviors are happening. We need to display a culture of fairness that focuses on risk analysis, system design, safety and human behavior.

Following these challenging times, we will need to adapt to our new normal, which includes new processes, strategies and culture. This adjustment takes time but will allow us to reflect as a team and reward each other of the challenges we have overcome. Rewards come in many ways, but words of affirmation like a personal thank you is the first step. Supporting each other in these challenging times is a huge achievement and will help build a stronger team. Now that we are seeing things level off, it is a perfect time to regroup as a team and plan new preventative measures that can be put in place for the future that we can control.

In conclusion, the only way we can be strong leaders is if we lead as a team and not as an individual. Any change, challenge or crisis needs to be reviewed from all levels, ensuring bottom-up communication is being heard layering on to the top-down management system currently in place. Our front-line workers have all the knowledge of barriers and struggles they face on a daily basis. We will only grow if we work together and maintain this open forum of communication between staff and management as this cannot be forgotten. Take the time during your day or week to ensure that you are free to connect with your staff. The best team is an engaged team, which can only be achieved when they are being heard.