Leadership is inherently a relational task: we lead with and through others.
Learning how to be effective at influencing others is essential for successful public health and medical leadership.
There are very few tasks at work which we can truly undertake on our own, and you are will already be well versed with working collaboratively and influencing others in order to improve patient, health, and societal outcomes.
As you progress in your own career, the scope of your leadership role is likely to grow significantly, and with it comes the opportunity to positively effect change at greater scale. There are always new relationships to be forged with a wide range of partners who may be outside of your usual working environment, such as clinicians, managers, Executive and Non-Executive Board members, colleagues or leaders in other health care organisations, academic institutions, industry, as well as local and national government, or international organisations.
Here are a few quick tips to take your influencing skills to the next level.
- Your values are at the heart of any leadership role. Get clear about your own values and who you want to BE in how you relate to other people as a health leader. Consider how close you are to living from your values on a daily basis and what you may need to do to clearly bring your values to life in your leadership role(s) – this will help to build trust over time, enabling you to be more effective at influencing others.
- Work out who your key stakeholders are in your leadership role(s). Map out who is currently involved in the work you are leading or moving into, and who needs to be involved in the future. Consider from all angles: who do you need to influence upwards to get support or permission from; who are your peers; who are your team members? Who are other key people internal to your organisation, as well as others external to your organisation in relevant roles? How will you build actively relationships with them in both formal and informal ways? Who are your key allies, influencers and early adopters than can help to influence at scale? Make sure you spend plenty of time in any new leadership role meeting all the key stakeholders that you will need to collaborate with and starting to build trust with them.
- Be a leader of leaders. It’s important to co-create a vision with others – you need to be able to see things that others can’t yet see and then to take your colleagues on a journey towards an unknown and unknowable future. Help them to feel confident that their views and perspectives matter, and that they are able to influence as well as be influenced. Who are the team members that will look to you for leadership and how will you empower them to lead in their own right? You’re the conductor of the orchestra, holding everything together and ensuring all the moving parts are working in synchrony. Coaching and mentoring skills are essential leadership skills!
- Be open to being influenced. In order to be truly effective at influencing others, we need to also be open to being influenced ourselves so that we can see things from others’ perspectives and keep developing and growing as health leaders. Knowing when to lead and when to learn from others will help you to grow in gravitas and maturity, so that you can effectively contribute to transforming services and improving health outcomes.
Dr Fiona Day is individually accredited as a Registered Chartered Coaching Psychologist with the British Psychological Society and by EMCC as a Master Practitioner Coach & Mentor. She is a former system and Board-level medical & public health leader. Fiona specialises in coaching medical and public health leaders, and trains health leaders in coaching and mentoring skills at EMCC EQA Foundation Level. Get 3 hours of FREE CPD with Fiona’s ‘Health Career Success Programme’ here, and listen to her NEW podcast ‘Transformational Thinking for Health Leaders’ here.
