Partnership model in clinical leadership

Client Requirements

This is a success story in clinical leadership based on a partnership model of doctors and managers working collaboratively to turn around a struggling mental health service.

The Executive Director and Associate Medical Director wanted to engage psychiatrists more closely with local managers, particularly in introducing more effective services for users.

Coaching Solution

We began by partnering up senior service managers with lead psychiatrists and they undertook the programme together. A cultural audit was commissioned to understand the current situation and the results were fed back to participants using the Myers Briggs Type Indicator, away-days to enable the groups to agree a common mission and understanding of roles and individual coaching for all participants to help them to
work effectively in their new roles.

An essential element of the programme was role modelling and the
participation of the Executive Director and Associate Medical Director, who had also undergone a similar development programme that resulted in them developing an effective, collaborative and trusting working relationship. The cultural audit was repeated at the end of the year. The first audit revealed a history of mistrust and lack of communication between doctors and managers. While they shared common goals, they had not taken the time to get to know each other and understand their motivations. Subsequently, they held more frequent catch-up meetings and worked more
collaboratively to improve patient services and deal with problems as they arose.

The success of the partnership model was apparent in the transformation of the locality service in terms of its credibility, capacity, performance outcomes and stability.