As a novice\u00a0leader I learned through reading \u00a0followed by experimenting with what I was learning. \u00a0I’m forever in debt to my team at the time for indulging me. \u00a0Without the opportunity to experiment and practice, I wouldn’t have developed into a leader. \u00a0My organization also provided me with a professional coach, which was essential for learning from the results of my experiments and reflecting on my practice.<\/p>\n
With knowledge and experience I entered larger circles where it appeared that most weren\u2019t reading the same books. \u00a0There were a few who were, and thank goodness for them. \u00a0As a physician leader I was following a different set of principles and driven by a different set of values than most. \u00a0It wasn’t an easy path. \u00a0My resolve, however, grew stronger, because every time I doubted myself, that original team cheered me on. \u00a0They knew long before I did, that I was a servant leader.<\/p>\n
My continued hunger for knowledge eventually brought me to learn about servant leadership. When I first read about it, it seemed so obvious.\u00a0\u00a0 And it helped me realize who I was as a leader and why I found it so hard to be a good one. It would have been easier to only worry about my own success and always be looking to boost my own ego. I was doing servant leadership and it was hard.<\/p>\n
Years later in the optional reading list of one of my classes at Harvard was an article entitled: \u201cThe Power of Servant Leadership to Transform Health Care Organizations for the 21st<\/sup> Century Economy.\u201d It was written by Richard Schwartz and Thomas Tumblin and published in 2002 (10 years earlier!). \u00a0I fell of my chair when I realized Dr. Schwartz was a surgeon, and the article was published in the Archives of Surgery<\/em> (no disrespect to my surgical colleagues, but renewed respect).<\/p>\n As I read it I couldn\u2019t help as a student of leadership to think that the concepts being professed in this article were revolutionary and exactly what we needed in healthcare (they were hypothesizing the same). I thought to myself, “So, why hasn’t the concept caught on?” Well… because it\u2019s hard. \u00a0duh.<\/p>\n Applying the concepts of servant, situational and transformational leadership to drive a learning organization is brilliant, but it\u2019s hard.\u00a0One would think it might be easier in health care than other industries. Not so. \u00a0 Why?<\/p>\n First, how we choose our leaders, especially our physician leaders, is not aligned with these styles of leadership.\u00a0\u00a0 Why is that? \u00a0Two reasons: 1) these attributes and skills are rare, and 2) the things we look for in our physician leaders are counter to them.<\/p>\n Second, how we train our leaders does very little to foster the attributes of these three styles. Why? Two reasons: 1) those doing the training, the mentoring and setting the example don\u2019t often have them, and 2) it takes a tremendous amount of self-reflection and self-awareness to be a servant leader. \u00a0It happens through self-driven training and transformation, and too many of us aren\u2019t reflecting and aren\u2019t aware enough. \u00a0One’s emotional intelligence must be high.<\/p>\n And finally, those who become physicians, those who are most driven to succeed and therefore be put in the leader spotlight got there because of a relentless focus on their own achievement, not on the achievement of teams and others.<\/p>\n Time to change the paradigm.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" As a novice\u00a0leader I learned through reading \u00a0followed by experimenting with what I was learning. \u00a0I’m forever in debt to my team at the time for indulging me. \u00a0Without the opportunity to experiment and practice, I wouldn’t have developed into a leader. \u00a0My organization also provided me with a professional coach, which was essential for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/leadingachildrenshospital.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/leadingachildrenshospital.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/leadingachildrenshospital.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leadingachildrenshospital.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leadingachildrenshospital.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=149"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/leadingachildrenshospital.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":164,"href":"https:\/\/leadingachildrenshospital.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149\/revisions\/164"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/leadingachildrenshospital.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leadingachildrenshospital.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leadingachildrenshospital.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}