Growing leadership capacity to meet health-care sector needs
By Ashley Scott, Program Director of the Master of Health Leadership and Policy and an Associate Professor of Teaching in the School of Nursing.
If you look at labour market reports, one trend stands out: health-care positions consistently rank among the most in-demand occupations. Here in BC, the sector is expected to hire tens of thousands of new employees over the next 10 years. But as the workforce expands, there’s an equally urgent need for qualified, trained and experienced leaders to support new hires, guide teams, maintain psychologically healthy workplaces and champion initiatives to improve patient care.
When we grow the workforce without growing leadership capacity, we run into problems. New clinicians enter the system, but there are fewer senior professionals able to provide mentorship or support their career progression. This imbalance contributes to burnout among experienced staff, inconsistent onboarding for new hires and ultimately, risks to patient care.
We don’t just need more health-care professionals, although we do. We need people who can develop those professionals throughout their careers. That’s the value proposition of the MHLP in Clinical Education: we prepare leaders to support a growing workforce and to innovate to make the system better.
The program helps students shift from focusing on individual contributions to understanding how to influence change at a system level. While some leadership skills can be learned informally on the job – such as by having a strong mentor or witnessing great leaders in action – unfortunately that experience is not universal. The MHLP offers a more reliable path. We offer a structured, supportive environment where students gain a strong foundation in the theory and practice of leadership and clinical education, as well as an incredible number of opportunities to apply that learning and grow into consistent and confident leaders.
Leadership is not an innate trait. I absolutely believe it is a set of competencies that can be taught, practised and strengthened. Through an integrated curriculum that combines courses in clinical education with courses in business (which cover topics ranging from organizational leadership to project management) students learn how to articulate ideas clearly, map out implementation plans and communicate value to decision makers. They learn how to get themselves to the right table, with the right skills, to move good ideas forward.
In my curriculum development course, for example, students work in interdisciplinary teams to design a curriculum that addresses a real gap in practice. They justify the need, develop the curriculum and present their work to peers and external experts, who provide concrete suggestions that they must integrate into a final presentation. The process creates many learning opportunities in group dynamics, presentation skills, sharing difficult feedback, setting goals, and iterating to create something better and push their ideas further.
We also place strong emphasis on communication, teamwork and adaptability – competencies that employers increasingly prioritize. Students practice giving and receiving constructive feedback, learn how to create psychologically safe learning environments and develop the skills needed to navigate interprofessional dynamics. Many early career clinicians work primarily within their own professional silo; leadership requires the ability to collaborate across disciplines. Our program brings together nurses, physicians, therapists and other professionals to learn from one another’s perspectives.
We go one step further. MHLP students take their leadership and business courses alongside engineers, architects and urban planners in the Master of Engineering Leadership program. Students gain the leadership and business acumen needed to articulate ideas clearly, build compelling cases for change and engage senior leaders effectively. Too often, innovative ideas stall because the people behind them lack the tools to communicate their value. MHLP students learn how to overcome those barriers.
Our students come from a wide range of countries, professions and leadership backgrounds. What unites them is a shared commitment to improving health-care systems. Their leadership capacity grows as they learn from one another, exchange ideas and receive feedback within a supportive, interdisciplinary community.
Over the course of the program, I see students’ confidence grow. They learn that their ideas are valid, their voices matter and they have the capacity to lead meaningful change. That transformation – from capable clinician to impactful leader – is exactly what our health-care system needs as it continues to expand.
The MHLP in Clinical Education develops the leaders who will support this growing workforce, strengthen teams and ultimately improve patient care.
