Warwick delivers senior leader programme with NHS Trust
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and Integration at UHCW, was impressed. “It’s all about reframing the problem,” he says. “The issue may be defined as ‘we’re not hitting our targets’ but the root cause of the problem itself might be something entirely different. The way something is defined and solved might be the source of the problem itself.” He credits the double loop concept with informing his decisions on a major project he has been leading on for the Trust – the transfer of community services to the emergency and acute service provision to join up services governed through the creation of one integrated care board. “It hasn’t just been about coming up with a strategic document – a manifesto, if you like, that everyone follows. It has been about engaging with others and understanding where they are coming from and what drives them. Then it is about reframing issues in response and coming up with new solutions.”
On a cold winter’s night, we are all relieved to find the central heating coming on as the thermostat follows its instructions to hit 20 degrees centigrade, or whatever temperature we have set it at. But what if the thermostat could question itself about whether it should really be set at 20 degrees or whether another solution should be sought for in-house heating. What if it could question our programming decisions, and the underlying assumptions that underpin them.
UHCW approached WBS to scope out a development programme for senior executives who manage the seven ‘directorates’ that make up the Trust. The result has been a programme that focuses on building capability around Systems Thinking and Systems Leadership delivered over three modules, each taught residentially over two days at the School. “The leadership environment in healthcare is constantly changing as the needs of our patients and communities change,” says Andy Hardy, Chief Executive of UHCW. “Therefore our leaders need to be able to improve, grow and innovate to continue to develop services that meet that need. This is even more important for senior leaders that lead across organisations and health and social care systems.”
Applying the theory he has learnt on the course to his practice has been key for Deas, as it has been for his fellow delegates. Edward Hartley, Group Clinical Director for Emergency Medicine and consultant in emergency medicine, believes that some of the learning on becoming a strategic leader in the first module in October 2023 influenced his approach to the trust-wide implementation of electronic patient record (EPR) and led him to recommend delaying the trust launch to the summer of 2024. It was in the autumn of 2023 that he and his two fellow senior executives in the Emergency Medicine Directorate decided to “separate out the implementation of EPR from the rest of our governance”. “We set up a separate operational implementation group and a range of different task groups which meant that we were picking up a better appreciation of risk. “Because we concentrated on outcomes rather than general NHS targets, I think we are now in a much safer place.” Meanwhile, Beth Harrison, Group Clinical Director of the Clinical Diagnostics Group, points to two areas – histopathology and breast screening – where the Leadership Programme has made a difference. “Our learning on strategy and performance encouraged us to sit down as a triumvirate during the Warwick meet-ups and on a weekly basis at UHCW to try and create a more detailed support structure for these two areas, especially histopathology where there can be a real mismatch between demand and workforce.”
Then, we would say that it was capable of double loop learning.
This type of learning has been just one of the key concepts under consideration on the Leadership Programme that Warwick Business School (WBS) has been running for the University Hospitals of Coventry & Warwickshire (UHCW) NHS Trust since the autumn of 2023.
And that double loop learning? Course delegate Jamie Deas, Director of Strategy
“The leadership environment in healthcare is constantly changing as the needs of our patients and communities change.”
Andy Hardy, Chief Executive of UHCW
wbs.ac.uk
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Leadership Programme
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